Accusations
by metamorphstorm
Summary: After the BSC falls apart, Claudia takes on a job with a new family for a sweet little girl. Is everything as innocent in the home as it appears, or is there something as wrong as Claudia is beginning to believe?
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1**

When the Baby-sitters Club began to fall apart, I couldn't exactly say I was surprised. As the vice-president and one of the first members—and one of the last—I'd slowly seen it coming.

When Kristy Thomas, the founder and president, began to lose interest, it was a pretty big shock. The short, plain girl with a big mouth and bigger ideas had been so interested in the club since she started it at the age of twelve that she often had us doing things with the kids we baby-sat for, like washing cars or holding summer camps, sometimes to raise money for a good cause and sometimes just for fun. I think the divorce between her mother and stepfather was the reason Kristy lost her interest, but it was still a surprise.

Mary Anne, one of the most timid members, was next. She and her father and their new family members (Mary Anne's best friend Dawn, also part of the club) and Dawn's mother, Mary Anne's father's second wife moved away.

Stacey was hit by a car and was killed in the month before her fourteenth birthday. Jessi began taking extra ballet classes when Mallory Pike, her best friend and another BSC member, left for boarding school to escape a disastrous time in school.

That left me, Claudia Kishi, with our associates, Logan and Shannon, who are usually really busy and only called on when necessary. The club disintegrated within three weeks.

Now, though, I've almost gotten used to being able to spend my time as I want. I still get a lot of baby-sitting jobs, but because clients never stopped calling, I raised my hourly rate to five dollars. And it didn't matter that I did, since I was one of the only well-known sitters around that people knew to call. I'd raised my grades and taken on an advanced art class, too, and I still found time for baby-sitting.

It was a good thing, too, because I had a job at six-fifteen with new clients, the wealthy Battista family. The job was for three-year-old Kerry, who I'd heard from a classmate, was very sweet.

I rushed out the door and caught the bus. It was better than walking. Three inches of snow had fallen in the last hour, and it was nearing fifteen degrees below zero.

When I finally found the Battista house, I was almost five minutes late. I kept my fingers crossed as I hurried up the shoveled walkway leading up to a huge house, decorated with flashy lights. I could see a big, fluffy pine tree glittering with golden lights and sparkly garlands and tinsel. I could see piles of presents stacked beneath.

_Please don't be mad, please don't be mad,_ I practically prayed, ringing the doorbell.

It was opened only seconds after I rang the bell, and I couldn't help but stare at the sight that greeted me.

"Hi. You must be Claudia. I'm Bobbi, Kerry's sister. Please, come in." The girl stepped aside with a brilliant smile.

She was obviously older than me, but I couldn't tell by how much. She had long, golden-blonde hair and bright, blue-green eyes, and flawless, peachy skin with pale, rosy cheeks. She was tall and muscular, and had a perfect figure that was flaunted by the tight purple and black leotard she was wearing. She was also wearing makeup and two silver rings pierced into each of her ears.

Beside her, smiling shyly up at me, was an adorable little girl with pale blue eyes and a pale little face framed by pale blonde tendrils that had fallen free from her pigtails. She was dressed in dark blue jeans, a pink mohair sweater, and pink and white sneakers. Her pigtails were held in place with silky white ribbons.

"This is Kerry. She'll be four in the spring. She's already had dinner and a bath, but she can have four Oreo cookies if she brushes her teeth, and she likes to be read silly stories before bedtime, which is usually eight-thirty. Emergency phone numbers are on the fridge, and I should be home by nine. My cell number is on the fridge, too."

"Didn't you say you were Kerry's older sister?"

Bobbi looked a little confused. "Yes."

"Oh. Okay," I said. But inwardly, I was thinking about why Bobbi, who couldn't have been more than eighteen, was acting as the parent to such a young girl.

Seeming to know my thoughts, Bobbi closed the door.

"Our mother is a widow and a lawyer," she explained, shrugging into a long black coat and picking up a purple book bag with a pink flower on the front. "She works a lot and doesn't have much time for Kerry. Since I'm about to graduate, I took on our mother's role for Kerry's sake. It isn't easy, but I've got my final tests coming up next week, and I have to study." She made her escape.

"Are you really fourteen years old?" Kerry asked, speaking perfectly and without the childish whine and confused words and the other 'learning to speak' issues most little kids have.

"Um…yes," I replied, surprised.

"Bobbi is only three years older," Kerry informed me, her big blue eyes, framed by long, thick eyelashes, blinking up at me.

I didn't know what to say. Luckily, Kerry didn't seem to care. She took my hand gingerly and led me to the kitchen. The whole house was beautiful, in blue and white. Kitchen appliances in stainless steel gleamed, and Kerry seated herself at the kitchen table. To ease some tension, I pulled the package of Oreos from the cupboard and poured two glasses half-full of milk. Kerry ate in silence.

After the snack, which I cleaned up while Kerry chose a board game from the stack on the den shelves, we played until eight, when Kerry brushed her teeth and I helped her put on her warm snowflake pajamas, which had been laid out on her bed. She fell asleep before her bedtime, and I spent the next forty minutes making sure no trace of our evening of games and Oreos was evident in the immaculacy of the house, thinking about how odd it was for someone only three years older than I was to raise a little child, full-time, without pay.

When Bobbi returned, she didn't seem to remember that she'd told me a lot about her situation. She paid me and I left.

"No, no, Kerry's really sweet," I told Emily Bernstein over the phone later that night. "She's only three, but she talks like she's much older. And she didn't complain or throw a fit about anything. Not brushing her teeth, or putting away the games, or going to bed."

"Yeah. That's what I've heard. Listen, what did you think of Kerry's big sister?"

"Bobbi?" I asked. "Well, she was—pretty mature, I think. Taking care of Kerry almost entirely by herself?"

"It's not like she has a lot of trouble with that. But that's exactly why we think she's so weird. How can a busy seventeen-year-old about to graduate from high school be the perfect mother to a three-year-old? It's not like her mother is there to help."

"She might be, some of the time. But what does that have to do with anything?"

"Think about it this way, Claudia. How much homework do you have? How much time a day do you think your mother has to do something around the house? Dishes, laundry, whatever. Bobbi must have some way to keep her little sister perfect, the house perfect, and make such perfect grades."

"What, you think…you think she _hurts_ her little sister?"

"Well, how else can she keep making straight A's and keep the house perfect? It's not like the Battista family would hire maids. Apparently the Battista family is composed of wealthy lawyers who have lots of enemies because of how many people they've helped prosecute. They almost never let outsiders into their house. And if Bobbi's hurting that kid, it makes sense why."

"I guess, but Bobbi didn't seem the type. When I was sitting for the Nicholls family, I knew one the first day that something wasn't right." (I'd told Emily* all about that situation, in which I'd once taken a job for some new clients that ended up being a much bigger situation than I'd imagined.) "And Bobbi really seems to care for Kerry, and Kerry really seems to look up to her."

"Yes, but if you'll be going back, be sure to keep an eye open for anything unusual," Emily finally said. "Just to be safe."

As it turned out, it was a good thing I was cautious. Bobbi called when Emily and I hung up and asked me to watch Kerry the next afternoon, and I agreed. Bobbi said something about needing to help a friend, and she sounded like she was telling the truth.

"If you can be here by about two, it would be perfect," Bobbi said. "Kerry will have had lunch and just woken up, so she can have a snack if she's hungry and will probably want to play. I shouldn't be more than an hour or two."

"Okay, sure," I agreed, and when Bobbi and I hung up, I called Emily back. "What kinds of things should I look out for?"

"Well, when you go there tomorrow, walk up the driveway slowly and see if anything looks out of the ordinary. Maybe see if you can hear Kerry crying, and when you see her, look for signs of bruising or marks that would tell you if she was hit. If she seems to be moving oddly, like she's in pain, keep it in mind. It may be more than that she slept wrong. And if you have a chance, maybe look around the house a little. You might find something incriminating."

"Like what? A bloody tissue?"

"I guess it's possible. Anyway, I have to go. I have to finish an essay for English class."

"Yeah, I guess I've got some homework, too. See you tomorrow."

We hung up and I lay back in bed. Having read many mysteries, I knew quite a bit about detective work. I knew what kinds of things would indicate that someone had been hurt. Then again, I couldn't exactly go crawling around in the Battista house in broad daylight; Kerry would probably tell her sister, and any 'detective game' I could make up would have to be explained carefully, either to Kerry or Bobbi, both of whom wouldn't see my side of things.

_How did I even get dragged into this?_

"See you in an hour or two!" Bobbi called, hurrying out.

Kerry stood in the hallway, watching me. This time, instead of wearing a pink sweater, she was wearing a cute, navy-blue denim skirt with a bright yellow tank top and dark blue stockings.

"I didn't know you were coming," Kerry informed me. "Bobbi was just about to play _Sorry!_ with me. Do you want to play?"

I hadn't thought it was a good idea, but it turned out that it was. We played seven games in a row before tiring of it and taking the _Checkers_ game from the shelf. And Kerry was good; she could count and played _Sorry!_ better than I'd expected she would. The other games we played were no different; Kerry could count and spell and even play strategic games I hadn't learned until I was ten.

"Are you sure you're three?" I teased, when I was putting game pieces back into the box and Kerry was drinking a glass of juice.

Kerry regarded me with solemn eyes, but didn't speak. I found myself feeling mesmerized by those eyes; like the eyes of most children, they reflected purity and innocence and trust, and yet, I sensed something darker, something _hidden_, in those icy, crystal-blue eyes. When Bobbi returned, I realized I hadn't had a chance to look around. Kerry had kept me perfectly busy the whole time.

* * *

"It was like she knew I was going to be looking around and kept me busy the whole time. It wasn't like she misbehaved at all, but she just managed to hold my attention. And she never answered my question."

"Well, she _is_ a child," Emily replied. "Even if she's strange, we know for sure she isn't more than four years old. And I don't think Kerry or Bobbi would lie about her age."

"Bobbi might, but children typically don't lie," I pointed out. Something I'd always loved about little kids was that they, without holding back, told the truth. If an adult asked if they were ugly or asked a question that could be answered to offend a person, a kid typically gave the answer that was true and wondered later why the adults were shocked. That happened to me; I'd tell someone if they were ugly if they asked, and it never occurred to me that people would lie about those things. Kids fascinate me.

"I know. Do you think it's weird that Bobbi keeps calling you? Doesn't her situation call for criminal history checks and having multiple sitters so nobody gets too close with the family?"

"Maybe she wants one person to trust," I said, after some thinking, "or maybe she wants Kerry to have a familiar face around."

"Or maybe she has some other reason. In any case, if she calls again, make sure you get the chance to look around."

"Emily? Can you remind me why we're so suspicious? They seem perfectly nice."

"A busy teenager with perfect grades is raising a child alone, in a situation where their parents are either dead or away at work a lot and they may have criminals out for revenge as enemies. Not just that, but Kerry is perfectly sweet and polite and innocent, totally unscarred by the death and practically abandonment by her parents. Doesn't any of that just seem a little weird to you?"

"Yes," I admitted, thinking it over. "But I've never heard Kerry mention anything being wrong, and I've never seen her with a bruise or cut or even a red mark," I added, remembering the Nicholls boys and the slapping sound I'd once heard when getting my jacket to leave after a job there. I'd seen one of the boys with a red cheek as I left, and been unsure. Since then, I'd figured out that there _was_ a case of child abuse happening, and we'd helped the kids and their mother into safety. Emily* had been a part of the rescue.

"Kerry may not have said anything because she's been told not to. Or threatened," Emily replied. "It wouldn't be the first case of child abuse in which a child is threatened not to say anything."

"But this isn't really a case of child abuse," I said. "We have no proof. And Kerry doesn't seem to have been threatened."

At that exact moment, my older sister peered into my room, eyes wide. I could tell she'd heard everything I'd just said.

"I have to go, Emily. I'll talk to you in a few minutes." Janine, my sister, stepped in and closed the door behind her. She seated herself on my bed and waited as I hung up and swiveled in my chair to face her. She pushed her glasses into place on her face.

But she didn't speak. She just sat there, in her plain, nerdy clothes, and waited for me to explain. She can be pretty annoying.

"You know how I told you the BSC fell apart?" I asked, even though I knew perfectly well she did. She'd spent a month being really nice and trying to make me feel better, even taking over my chores sometimes. "Well, I'm one of the only baby-sitters around now, so a new family in town, the wealthiest clients I've ever had, called me to look after a little girl. It turns out that she's being raised almost entirely by her teenage sister." I explained the rest to her, even adding that I'd been there only twice and that Bobbi and Kerry were both pretty sweet. I described both girls as best I could.

"Nothing sounds strange about that situation to me," Janine replied, keeping her meticulously precise word choice perfect. (She talks like a dictionary. Oh, excuse me. She _speaks_ like a dictionary.) "It sounds like Bobbi is doing a wonderfully adequate job."

"I think so, too." I hurriedly explained what Emily thought, and why. "And it does seem a little weird, considering everything."

"The next time you go watch Kerry, see that she is involved in an activity before you do any investigating. The only way to proceed wisely is to know exactly what's going on."

When Janine left, I called Emily back and told her everything about my conversation with Janine. When we hung up, I lay back on my bed and sighed.

And found myself crossing my fingers and hoping I'd get another call from Bobbi Battista.

The next morning, after a long, hot shower, I relaxed as I ate a bowl of cereal and worked on the only homework we'd been assigned before Spring Break, which had started after school the day before the previous day. I was halfway through the assignment (homework had become easier) already when Bobbi called.

"I'm sorry to be calling so early, but something has come up. If you can come over to watch Kerry for a few hours, I'll pay you triple."

(I wasn't about to say I'd been hoping she'd call, but I wasn't going to tell her I didn't have plans anyway. I agreed.)

"No problem, when should I be there?"

Only half an hour later, with my books under my arm, I found myself ringing the Battista doorbell.

It was opened seconds later. Bobbi, wearing tight camouflage cotton pants and a tight white tank top and white sneakers, hurried past me. "Numbers are on the fridge!"

Behind her, just like the last two times, Kerry waited patiently for me to come inside. She watched me seriously, with a small smile. Almost a knowing smile, like she knew something I didn't.

We spent three hours playing before Kerry fell asleep, and I took the opportunity, when she was sleeping soundly on the couch, to look around. Being as quiet as I could, I walked slowly through each room in the house and peered into closets. I saw nothing strange, and looking again and this time crawling around and standing on my toes for a new view didn't help. The only thing I noticed was that the house was incredibly clean. Even when my mother spent hours cleaning, our house was never as clean as the Battista house always seemed to be. _That_ was a little suspicious, but not enough to convict someone of child abuse. Maybe the cleanliness wasn't to hide evidence. Maybe Kerry or Bobbi or their mother had allergies.

Kerry woke up about an hour after I began my search, about fifteen minutes after I'd given up and settled myself in on a reclining armchair and flipped through the stack of magazines (each the latest edition and organized alphabetically) on the table beside me.

That was how Bobbi found us when she came home; me tidying the stack of magazines and Kerry just sitting up and stretching sleepily.

And Bobbi, who had promised to pay me triple, shelled out a _one-hundred dollar bill_ and handed it to me.

"I know it's forty dollars more than I said it would be, but I can't thank you enough for coming," Bobbi replied, answering my unasked questions. My expression must have given me away. "My friend—the one I went to help the other day—is in crisis. Her parents are divorcing, and she's really upset. She tried to kill herself." As if she'd suddenly come back to reality, Bobbi looked shocked that she'd said so much, and shook her head as if to disperse the truth from the air. "Anyway, I'd like to make you an offer. If you can manage it, I think it would be wonderful for Kerry if you were a more routine sitter. Kind of like being on-call, at least until the winter break is over. And hopefully my friend will be out of crisis then. I can pay ten dollars an hour, and it could be erratic hours."

"Erratic?" I repeated.

Bobbi sat back, quickly peering over her shoulder to make sure Kerry, slowly eating a honey graham cracker at the table, was oblivious to us.

"My friend isn't the most stable, and wasn't even before her parents announced the divorce. The hours that someone needs to be here to watch Kerry could be as many as five a day, and could be overnight or early in the morning."

I nodded. "I'd like to…but, is it okay if I ask questions?"

"Of course," Bobbi replied, with a quick nod.

"Well…I don't mean to pry, but isn't your mother home at night?"

Bobbi looked serious. "Not always. She's usually home by ten, but she isn't always. And she leaves early in the morning. She hasn't been the best with schedules and parenting since my father's death, and I didn't want to see Kerry off to some kind of foster home. I don't usually reveal personal details, but if you accept the job with us, I feel it's only fair to let you in further than just as someone who comes often to watch Kerry. It's hardly fair for you to take on caring for a child when you don't know the basics of the family."

I nodded. So far, everything was understandable. Despite some 'bumps in the road,' as my mother would say, the eldest daughter of the Battista family seemed to have everything under control.

"I hope my friend won't need me much," Bobbi added. "I've told her father everything I know, and he seemed concerned enough to want to get some help for her. But until then…"

"Until then, I'd be happy to be Kerry's baby-sitter until I'm not needed," I said, to which Bobbi smiled.

My mother was both confused and pleased by my new job. But she didn't forbid it, despite the possible odd hours, since I didn't tell her everything. I noticed Janine watching me across the breakfast table the next day.

"You did not tell the whole truth," she observed aloud, when my mother had left the house for her shift at the library.

"I know. And it won't matter. Didn't _you_ say nothing seemed weird about the family?"

"Yes, I did. But it does not matter. You should tell Mom the truth if there is nothing to hide."

I kept from rolling my eyes until Janine had left the room.

In the past, all of this would have been the kind of thing I could have called Stacey or Kristy or Mary Anne about. But Stacey was dead, and things had changed. Mary Anne's house had burned down, and she and her family eventually moved away for a fresh start. Kristy probably wouldn't care if I told her what was happening. The fire had left Kristy, and she now spent most of her time lounging around in front of the TV and insulting people with sarcastic remarks. We'd lost touch with Mallory about six months after she'd gone to boarding school, and Jessi and her family had moved to a city just past Stamford when Aunt Cecelia died. (Jessi was taking her ballet lessons at an advanced school of dance and 'performing arts'.) Abby had gotten so involved with sports (and Logan had, too) that she was constantly out of the house when I called, and never responded to messages I left for her. Logan was busy with sports and his new girlfriend, a friend of Stacey's old boyfriend Robert; someone named Andi Gentile or something. Shannon, forever the academic star student and role model for fifty years into the future, was also busy and had made it clear she could 'no longer be bothered with petty little children and frivolous, superficial problems.'

Emily Bernstein was pretty much all I had left.

I updated her on the new situation and she went on for a while about how many new opportunities this created.

Emily was pretty sure Bobbi was abusing Kerry, but I wasn't. It was obvious to me that Emily was very into this 'case,' but as much as I missed solving mysteries with the BSC (which was a Mary Sue of a club if I'd ever seen one) I wasn't ready to accuse Bobbi of hurting a little girl when there wasn't any evidence and both of them seemed perfectly nice _and_ perfectly honest.

I decided to wait and see. Bobbi was bound to call again, and I intended to take advantage of the 'erratic hours' to do some investigating, whether I was certain there was something to investigate or not.

* * *

- **Author's Note: Okay, to anyone who was reading my other Baby-Sitters Club fan-fic, _Boundaries_, I should explain: I lost interest in it but still have a copy, so anyone interested can finish the story if they want, as long as they credit me for the four short chapters I wrote. Yes, I am a terrible author. I have excuses, though.**

**Anyway, one of my favorite (and there weren't many) BSC books was **_**Claudia And The Terrible Truth.**_** (The Nicholls family mentioned in this story is copyright to Ann Martin and Scholastic.) Bobbi Battista and Kerry, as well as this plot, are MINE. The asterisk by Emily Bernstein's name in this chapter represent that I think, but am not sure, that Emily was the girl in **_**Claudia/Terrible Truth**_** that baby-sat the Nicholls boys and helped Claudia rescue them from their abusive father. Please correct me if I'm wrong! And to explain, I used Emily because, for some reason, even as a minor character in the BSC series she seemed nice and like a character with a lot of potential, though I don't think she ever amounted to anything more than a supporting character. She might end up reprising her role here.**

**I do think this chapter, although one of my longest ever, is a bit boring and probably repetitive, but for those with hope for the more hopeless of fan-fiction authors, I think it will get better. In any case, I'm hoping I won't lose interest in this story! It's got a much better plotline and much more motivation than _Boundaries _did! If you enjoyed or have criticism for me, please review!** -


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

It was nearly three days before Bobbi called on me again, and it was nearing eight P.M. when my phone rang. I didn't know who could be calling (I hadn't forgotten about my steady job with Kerry, but with the chaos of it being the one-year anniversary since my grandmother's death, I'd let it go to the back of my mind.)

"Hello?" I said, when I picked it up.

It was Bobbi, of course. "Claudia? If you can be here in two or three minutes, I really need you! My friend's in crisis…"

"On my way," I said, just as Bobbi hung up. _She must really be in a rush,_ I thought, throwing my oil paints into the basket of my easel and hopping across my floor into my socks. I'd been working on a still-life on one of the biggest canvases I'd ever used, of a bowl of fruit. It was only about halfway done, though. I should have been further along, but my father had made me finish my homework (the assignment I'd taken to my second or third job with Kerry) before I could work on my painting, so I was a bit behind. Luckily, I had another five days to work on it.

I was on the front porch of the Battista house within five minutes (and oblivious to the cold, since I'd been pedaling my bike like it was my last hope) and, like every other time, Bobbi bolted from the house almost without instruction and Kerry waited patiently for me inside.

Unlike most times, though, Kerry was dressed for bed already. She was _so_ cute, wearing a long white nightgown printed with pink roses and pink lace at the collar, sleeves and hem. She was barefoot and cradled a plushy bear under one arm. She looked up at me, sleepily rubbing one eye with a fist. She managed a sleepy smile.

Bobbi had managed to tell me (as she sprinted past me at four hundred miles an hour) that Kerry had already brushed her teeth and had a bath, and shouldn't need anything to eat. She added that she didn't know when she'd be back, but to call if there was a problem. I felt lucky that I'd copied her number down and kept it in my purse, even though the numbers all still seemed to be on the fridge.

I read from a thick book of shortened fairy tales to Kerry until she fell asleep, which didn't take long. Then I carried her up to her room.

One thing I didn't miss about the Baby-sitters Club was writing in the notebook. Kristy had been pretty persistent; we all had to read everything everyone wrote in it, and we had to write up every detail about our own jobs. It could be pretty annoying sometimes. However, had I had to write up the Battista job in the notebook, I probably wouldn't have admitted how strange this was.

Of course, Kristy would have wanted to investigate and I wouldn't have been the only sitter on the job. But if Mary Anne had been here, taking on the task of pretending watching Kerry was a job, I wouldn't have had to admit to anyone how nervous I was.

_At any time_, I kept thinking, _someone could burst in here, either to rob the place or take revenge on the lawyers who helped put them behind bars._ The house was certainly nice enough for a robbery, and if what Emily had said was true, the Battista family had put away enough serious criminals to result in enemies who'd want revenge.

_Or this could be just like a mystery story where an unsuspecting baby-sitter is awake at night and listening for the baby when she hears some other noise and it's a murderer or a rapist or kidnapper—but in this case, it could be someone fresh out of jail who wants to put Bobbi's mother out of commission for good…_

Stop that, I reprimanded myself. You are here to baby-sit, not to panic over the possibilities.

Kerry, of course, gave me no trouble. She was still sound asleep and breathing evenly when I checked in on her an hour after she'd fallen asleep.

_Time to do some investigating,_ I thought. I began in the kitchen, knowing how easy it would be to explain what I was doing if caught. _Looking for the cups_, I could say. Or even, _I broke a bowl and I wanted to make sure there was no glass on the floor_.

I don't know what I expected to find by opening the cupboards, since they all had glass windows in the doors that let me see the flowery, clean white china stacked neatly inside.

I opened the drawers, but the only thing out of the ordinary was that the Battista family didn't have a 'junk drawer,' as my mother calls it. We always have a drawer in the kitchen where we keep odds and ends; rubber bands, paperclips, yarn, bread clips, and Mom's phone address book. The Battista kitchen held no secrets or surprises aside from the fact that they didn't have any junk.

I searched the bathrooms next, and the only thing I found was, as I'd joked with Emily about, a tissue bloodied in red. _Maybe its makeup or someone had a nosebleed. It may not mean anything._

But there was nothing I could do about it. If I took it home (which would mean having my fingerprints on it, not to mention touching someone else's blood) there was no way to prove it had ever even been in the Battista house. The police could say I'd done it, and probably wouldn't even do a DNA test on it.

In the den, I found only one thing out of the ordinary. A book called _Weighed Down: The Gravity Of Gravity_ (which had a barcode sticker with _Science 12_ printed on it) in the couch cushions.

I didn't dare search the bedrooms, and I went upstairs only to check on Kerry when it had been two hours since she'd fallen asleep. It was now ten-thirteen, and I yawned.

_Thump!_

I almost yelped, jumping to my feet without even realizing what I was doing. I bolted for the stairs, sure Kerry had fallen out of bed (she had a cute bed, with huge colorful pencils as bedposts) and peeked in on her. But she remained in her bed, stretched out in exactly the same position I'd seen her in the first time I'd checked in on her, and I turned, suddenly nervous that someone was downstairs. I descended the stairs slowly. If the thump hadn't been Kerry, who could it have—

"Claudia?"

This time, I did yelp. I spun around and found Bobbi, wearing silver jewelry and a tight, long black dress (the same outfit she'd been wearing earlier) watching me curiously from the kitchen doorway.

"I'm sorry," she apologized. "I didn't mean to scare you."

"I'm okay," I said, even though my heart felt like it was going to explode out of my chest with every beat.

Bobbi paid me and I left, biking home as quickly as I could without slipping on the ice. Despite the cold air, I was hot once again, still pumped full of adrenaline.

But I was scared, too. Bobbi's eyes, which usually held a look almost as innocent as Kerry's, were dark and cold. As an artist, I could better put words to emotions I saw in people's eyes. And if I was going to try and paint or even just describe the look in Bobbi's eyes, there was no doubt in my mind the words I would use or the emotion I'd try and portray. _Hatred_. _Agony_._ Terror_. It was shocking to see such emotion on her face, which was so beautiful and usually so composed. And it was confusing, too. I knew that going through a lot of hardship could cause a person's eyes to seem older, even if the person was young. Seventeen wasn't much more than fourteen, and I doubted I could handle raising a three-year-old alone. And Bobbi's eyes had seemed to radiate such emotion, so strong, I could _feel_ it.

But what could possibly cause Bobbi such intense, awful feelings? I was still wondering when I crawled into bed that night, and I fell asleep late in the night without an answer.

"No, it was like when they show that video footage of the veterans every Remembrance Day at the assembly," I told Emily over the phone the next morning, thankful for the privacy of my own room. "Like when you see those eyes and you can tell they've seen a lot of horrible things."

"That doesn't explain anything, but it does mean something," Emily replied. "But I don't know what. Maybe the stress of the whole family situation has gotten to her."

"Maybe, but she was okay when she left," I said. "And she seems so strong, I can't imagine that something like stress would get to her."

"Remember the assemblies at the beginning of every semester? They always tell us that stress can affect anyone, no matter how strong or happy they seem. It's just like depression."

"Yeah, but…I just don't know. I don't think any amount of stress could cause someone's eyes to reflect such strong emotion."

To change the subject away from the psychological aspects of it, I told Emily about the searching I'd done and the tissue I'd found.

"A bloody tissue!" Emily sounded delighted. "I mean, it's not good, but at least you found _something_."

"Um, Emily? Why are you so into this, aside from for Kerry's sake? How well do you know the Battista family?"

"I baby-sat for them a few days after they got here," Emily answered. "Bobbi said something about having to go grocery shopping, and I thought that was weird enough since she'd said she was Kerry's sister. But then I sat for Kerry twice since, and I've never seen their mother. Have you?"

"No. Never," I said, realizing it for the first time. "But when…why did you start thinking something might be wrong with the family?"

"I went to baby-sit for Kerry the fourth time and she had a big, dark bruise on her forearm," Emily explained. "So I mentioned it to Bobbi, and she's never called me back to sit for Kerry again."

"Weird."

"Yeah. Kerry said she fell down the stairs, but I don't think that happened. I know she's not lazy, but I've never seen her go running through the house or skipping down the stairs. She's more the cautious-kid type. I've seen her going from the den to the kitchen, and hold onto the wall when she passes the stairs."

"Weird."

"Yeah," Emily replied, and we giggled.

"Were you ever…you know, scared…to baby-sit at night for her?"

"Not really. I know it's a little risky, considering the criminals, but the pay was decent and Kerry was sweet. Besides, the whole house is full of alarms and cameras."

Oops.

* * *

_They'll know I was snooping,_ I thought, as I got off the bus and headed slowly down the street toward the Battista mansion. _This probably isn't a job. She called me over to ask me about it, or fire me…_

I rang the doorbell and wiped my palms on my pants. I was nervous. I flipped my ponytail over my shoulder.

When the door opened, Bobbi looked less composed than I was used to. She was wearing a cute dark blue sweat set over a pale blue tank top with white sneakers, her hair pulled back with a blue headband, and she looked tired.

"Come on in," she said, stepping aside. She managed a small smile.

My heart was beating like a firecracker.

Bobbi seated herself on the pristine white couch in the living room, and I found a seat across from her. Kerry was asleep on the couch across from me, beside her sister, and I forced myself to stifle my gasp (it hurt) as I noticed something new about Kerry. Not the fetal position, or the same teddy bear clutched in her arms, or even the fact that it was ten A.M. and she was still in her pristine nightgown.

She had a black eye.

Oblivious to my shock and horror, Bobbi leaned forward and spoke quietly.

"You know how I've been calling you often to watch Kerry while I help a friend? Um…it's not easy to say, but my friend committed suicide shortly after I left last night. We had a fight while I was with her and I left. I shouldn't have. When her father came to get her an hour or so ago when she didn't come out for breakfast, he found her hanging from a rafter in the attic with a rope around her neck."

I gasped. "Oh, no…I'm so sorry."

Bobbi nodded. "Yes. And I hope it won't be an inconvenience if you can continue coming over on call for a while. As one of the only people my friend would let get close to her, it'll be my job to answer a lot of questions. And I don't want Kerry to hear anything," Bobbi added. "She has enough nightmares as it is."

_And you might be one of them_, I thought. But I didn't dare say anything out loud; I suddenly felt horrible. Bobbi was doing her best and dealing with horrible problems nobody should have to deal with, and she was doing it alone. And here I was, thinking she hurt her little sister.

But then I looked back at the black eye. It was still there, as apparent as ever. Kerry remained asleep, as though she wasn't even aware of the horrible bruise marking her soft face. Looking closely, I could see that the bruise was slightly swollen, and that tiny lacerations, barely visible, marked the bruise in an _X_-shape.

"Um…can I ask why Kerry has a black eye?" I was unsure of what Bobbi would say to that, and I sat in tense silence for a millisecond that seemed millennia long.

"She fell down the stairs."

* * *

"Fell down the stairs?" Emily repeated. "What did you _say_?"

"Well, I couldn't exactly tell her you'd gotten the same story about Kerry's bruise!" I exhaled sharply, biting into a Kit-Kat bar. I'd never outgrown the need for candy, but my parents hadn't outgrown their stuffy outlook on mysteries and junk food, so I still kept it (and my mystery books and movies) hidden in my room and usually ate it only when I was stressed out or frustrated. Today, I was both.

"I know, but I mean about the job. Are you going back?"

"Yes. I have to," I replied. "It's the only way I can find out for sure what's going on."

"Don't you think you've learned enough? The bloody tissue, the black eye, the confused stories…"

"I know, but there could be more to this," I replied. "What if Bobbi's mother is dead and Bobbi's actually raising Kerry alone, but doesn't want anyone to know because they'd take Kerry away? Or what if Bobbi's mother is actually the one abusing Kerry? _Or,_ maybe Kerry really did fall down the stairs and is just really polite in front of guests and baby-sitters."

"I don't know," Emily replied doubtfully. "I'd hate to be wrong…or right…about this and have Kerry suffering alone out there. Maybe we should tell someone before things _really_ go wrong."

"Maybe…but it's also wrong to accuse people of things you haven't actually seen them do," I cautioned. "All we have to go on is the fact that we've each been told Kerry fell down the stairs to explain a bruise and a black eye."

"And when I pointed out what I saw, I was fired," Emily replied pointedly. "Well, not officially, but Bobbi said she might not call back because her aunt was coming to stay with them, and now we know there's no relatives staying with them. We also know she's hiring other sitters _and_ never called on me to look after Kerry again."

"I still think we should wait," I insisted.

"How long? What if next time you go to sit for Kerry you find her with a knife next to her throat?"

"I know, I know. It's risky to wait. But I'll go and sit for the Battista family once more, and if _anything_ is out of the ordinary, I promise we'll tell someone."

"Okay," Emily replied hesitantly. "I won't tell anyone as long as you promise we'll tell someone if anything else seems strange after the next time you watch Kerry."

"I promise," I repeated.

"Okay. I really don't like this, though. I was going to tell my mother about this when Bobbi didn't call me back for a week—she'd been pretty consistent with calling me, just like she has been with you, up until then. I was wondering whether or not she actually had an aunt coming to stay with them, or if she'd find someone else to watch Kerry. In a way, I'm glad it was you."

"Why?"

"Well, it's the only way I know anything else about this situation. It was all I could think about for weeks. I just kept wondering how little Kerry was doing. Its why, if I seem a little pushy or nosy, I ask so many questions about this. It's just that I can't stand to see people or animals suffer. Especially not little kids like Kerry."

I leaned back in my bed and sighed a little.

"Neither do I. But this just seems so different than the situation with the Nicholls kids," I told Emily, when I'd swallowed the last of my chocolate bar. "With them, it just felt wrong. Everything about that situation felt wrong. So I knew what to do that was right. But with Kerry…I don't know. Kerry is so angelic and adoring of Bobbi, who is protective and loving of Kerry. Maybe we're wrong and Bobbi's just a really good older sister and Kerry's just prone to falling down the stairs. I knew a two-year-old who was just learning to climb stairs when _he_ was two, and another little girl when she was three. Stairs can be a big obstacle at that age."

"You promised," Emily reminded me.

"I know."

"So what else is different about this situation?" Emily asked. "From the situation with Joey and Nate to the situation with Kerry."

"Well, there were two Nicholls boys and there's only one Battista child," I said thoughtfully. "Joey and Kerry were about the same age. And I was a baby-sitter in each case."

"I don't think any of that has anything to do with it, though. Age, gender, and Claudia Kishi don't equal child abuse."

I laughed. It sounded forced. It was.

"Look, just give me a call after your next job with the Battista family, okay? I have to go; lunch is ready. Good luck!"

As I hung up, Emily's last words rang in my mind. _Good luck._

Would I need luck?

I wasn't sure. That fact scared me more than the noise I'd heard that night I was baby-sitting for Kerry when she was sleeping.

_Good luck?_

* * *

**Author's Note: This may be an odd end to the second chapter, but I'd already been working on it for approximately two and a half hours (all in one sitting, when I wrote the first chapter I let it be written in TWO days!) and here it is. Thank you to everyone who reviewed the first chapter!**


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

**POV: Emily Bernstein**

_I huddled on my bed as the door downstairs slammed shut. Only one person would come home at three A.M. and slam the front door. Only my father would come home at three A.M.; my mother never came home before eight A.M., if she made it home within the same forty-eight hour period at all. And as my father's heavy footsteps started up the stairs, I cringed, knowing what was coming…_

I woke up in a cold sweat, gasping for air. Memories of my childhood haunted my dreams almost every night. It didn't make dealing with them any easier.

I'd read the statistics reports in school. It was my job as one of the only people working for the school newspaper. I'd done a report on how child abuse isn't something rare, and I'd added a statistics bar graph to indicate that it wasn't just big cities that had the problem. Even and sometimes especially little towns had the same problem. And I'd done the report only because a local charity working with rescued children and animals needed donations. My article provided almost three _thousand_ dollars in donations for the charity.

It didn't make me feel much better.

My father never really abused me sexually. But he called me names, hit me, and practically tortured me. Forcing me to take a freezing cold bath, all the while practically suffocating me with the stench of his alcohol and cigarette breath. Poking me when I was naked, laughing at me, telling me I was ugly and would never amount to anything more than a slut.

I didn't understand all of what he said. I was almost six when the abuse really began (three at first, but I didn't know it was truly wrong yet) and close to eleven when it ended. Now, three years after my father had been sent to jail and I'd been sent to stay with my aunt, the nightmares plagued me still.

"_Why are you so into this, Emily_?" _Claudia kept asking_. "_Why do you think for sure this __is a case of child abuse_?"

She wouldn't believe me if I told her.

Well, she probably wouldn't. Most people don't believe things like that if there aren't scars or videos to prove it. Knowing she'd dealt with child abuse situations before in her baby-sitting club didn't help. I wasn't a helpless little boy…or girl…anymore.

And now there was a new case of child abuse happening.

_Maybe._ Claudia's voice rang in my mind like a hammer on a nail. She wasn't certain yet that there was any reason for concern, even though she'd promised me she'd talk to someone if there seemed to be a problem the very next time she sat for Kerry.

And maybe it was good to be cautious. I'd watched enough episodes of _Court Case_ to know that even just accusing someone of something they didn't do could put the person who thought they were doing something good behind bars.

_But maybe someone said, "Maybe there's no reason to tell anyone yet," when they heard my screams coming from the tiny attic bedroom I was locked in. Maybe they wondered if I was starving or cold or sick or hurt, and just didn't want to be involved. Maybe they thought my screams were part of a game. After all, who would suspect the drunken idiot stumbling home to his little girl, alone in the house since he'd left the night before, to be hurting her? Who would think the bruises on the girl's body were the direct cause of a man who couldn't even control his need for beer?_

Yeah, right. I'd been told a simple accident was the cause of a bruise I'd found when looking after her, and a month later, my friend is told that a black eye is the result of the exact same accident. And she'd found a bloodied tissue in the bathroom garbage. What kind of proof did she _need_?

I didn't fall asleep again. It wouldn't matter too much. It was Christmas break, and there was no school for another two weeks. I'd tell my aunt I was too excited to sleep. She'd believe me, or pretend to, and we'd go on about our day. She'd once tried taking me to a psychologist for help, and I'd refused to talk. I didn't know what to say. As much as I hated my father, he was my _father._ I didn't know what to say to them. He was already in jail, and telling the truth wouldn't get him out. My silence didn't free him, either, though, and now I was glad for that. I hoped never to see him again.

_And maybe I'll help Claudia find out what's really happening with the Battista family._

I knew I didn't have much proof that there was child abuse in this situation, but what else could it be? My own proof sounded lame, and my reasons explaining it sounded feeble. _She never called me back after I mentioned the bruise._ So what? Maybe she didn't want me making a big deal out of it. Maybe Kerry just didn't like me. Whatever the reason, pointing out that Bobbi hadn't ever called me back afterwards only made me sound bitter and lame.

When enough time had passed, I got up to eat and shower. Getting up too soon after a nightmare always woke my aunt, who was always concerned and asked too many questions.

The thing was, I always forced myself to wake up before the dreams got too far. I always did when I realized what kind of dream it was going to be. But I never managed to stop my dream and wake up before my father was back in my head, ready to torment me. And I didn't know how to keep him out, or if I ever could.

* * *

I ducked down behind a sweater display and peered through the wool. Bobbi and Kerry, hand-in-hand, had just rounded a shoe rack and were looking through the display case at the jewelry section.

I didn't want Bobbi to see me. It had only been five or six weeks since I'd been Kerry's baby-sitter and Bobbi would recognize me. I scanned Kerry quickly, but if she was bruised, but under her ski pants (purple) and matching jacket (with pink flowers, that matched the leotard and book bag Claudia had described to me as being Bobbi's) I couldn't tell. However, no amount of winter clothing could hide the terrible bruise on Kerry's left eye.

"Are you hungry?" Bobbi asked, when Kerry pulled herself away from the display of sparking gold, silver, and gems.

Kerry nodded, looking up at her sister. "Can we get burgers?"

_Oh, come on! What three-year-old is naturally that nice? And what kid at __twelve can eat in public without a big fuss?_

But I wasn't surprised.

_Stop being such an idiot,_ I told myself. _All the kid did was ask for burgers._ Then again, I knew most kids that age and older would ask to have ice cream or chocolate bars for lunch. And I knew Kerry wasn't a typical three-year-old; when I sat for her, she scrubbed under her nails and even filed them, making them smooth. She was like one of the little alien kids in a futuristic space movie. I was going insane, analyzing everything.

I gave up about half an hour later. I'd been doing my best to avoid Bobbi, and I doubted she'd seen me. Even so, it was hard to keep shopping and try to hide at the same time.

I headed for the library. We hadn't been assigned any homework other than a one-page essay on the topic of what Christmas meant to us, and I'd already finished. I also wanted to return a book I'd been reading, _Alone At Ninety Foot_. Besides, Claudia had been spending a lot of time there to raise her grades, and I didn't doubt she'd be there, taking advantage of the extra 'study time.'

And I had another reason for going to the library, too. My best friend, Kelly, had once told me about a book she'd found full of tips for girls who baby-sat. One of the chapters had included 'Tips for Handling Delicate Situations' and a special section on recognizing a case of child abuse.

I found it and headed for the back of the library, where Claudia's preferred table (sandwiched between two tall sets of shelves so she could snack and study at the same time without being caught) was. It was impossible to sneak up on her at that table, so I approached quietly and found her with a big bag of sour cream and onion chips and a bottle of Coke, a stack of books on each side of her and another stack of books in front of her.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

She looked up, startled. "Researching mental disorders."

It was a big stretch from the thirteen-year-old Claudia Kishi who would skip assignments and work only when she really had to, and make awful grades most of the time anyway.

"During Christmas break?" I asked.

"Actually, I was researching mental disorders of a different kind…you know, the kind that cause an adult who seems perfectly normal otherwise to abuse people, especially little kids."

"That's kind of why I'm here, too," I said, setting the book I'd picked out down in the shiny wooden table.

"'_300 Tips to Turn You into a Great Baby-Sitter_?'"

I nodded. "A friend recommended it to me."

"You _told_ someone about this?" Claudia's voice held soft, barely contained anger.

"No! She told me about this last year, and I just remembered it this morning. Actually, I spent the whole morning dodging Bobbi at the mall, so I figured I'd come hang here and try to find a book to help."

"Was Kerry with her?" Claudia asked, suddenly interested, and I nodded as I seated myself in the seat across from her.

"Yes, and I couldn't tell if she had any new bruises. But she _did_ have a black eye."

"I know. I forgot to mention it to you when we talked on the phone yesterday morning. Awful, isn't it?"

"You _did_ mention it yesterday, remember?" I picked a chip out of Claudia's bag and bit into it. "When you told me Bobbi'd said Kerry fell down the stairs."

"Oh, right. Yeah. It looks awful, though."

"Are you okay?" I asked.

"Not really. I mean, I was, but I'm reading up on 'The Subtle Signs,' and it looks like Bobbi and Kerry both have some of them. It says abused children may act as polite as possible in front of strangers and in public to throw off suspicion, and the people who abuse children may act perfectly nice and polite…and _may even invent stories to cover their__ tracks_."

We huddled together around the books and read through chapter after chapter. And Claudia was right; there _were_ a lot of 'subtle signs' that Bobbi and Kerry had both been showing us all along.

"I'm going to check them out and take them home," Claudia informed me, taking the book I'd picked out from me and placing it on a stack of books she had in her arms. "The other books aren't of much help."

"I'm coming with you. I want to read more of chapter seven," I said, "and take notes. This might also be good for a report down the road somewhere."

* * *

"'Abused children often live in places that don't seem the type where anything is wrong,'" Claudia read aloud, stuffing a handful of hot, buttery popcorn into her mouth. "'If a home is perfect and small children live there, it might be an indication that the children aren't allowed to play or are punished for making a mess.'"

"Really? The Battista home kind of fits that description," I pointed out. "It's perfect all the time. When I was three, my mother considered hiring a maid. And when I was six, she did."

It was only a partial lie. My mother had wanted to hire a nanny to take care of me, since she'd gotten a warning from the police that she would be charged if she ever left me alone at home again while she went out drinking. We lived in a bad neighborhood, and she'd left me alone all night several times. And when I was six, she'd gotten her boyfriend (the one she had at the time, since there were many) to look after me in exchange for drugs. She was prostituting herself for those drugs, and I don't even want to know how she paid for the food, what little we had. I was just lucky a concerned neighbor eventually happened to notice this odd situation and call for help. Had I not been placed with my aunt when I was nine (though the abuse continued for two years because he hadn't officially gone to trial yet and was therefore, 'innocent until proven guilty') she'd probably have tried to prostitute me, too.

Claudia only nodded. "I know kids are usually messy. But sometimes I wonder if Kerry is really even a child. She doesn't talk like one, and she only seems to act like one when I'm right there with her. She looked bored out of her mind when we were playing board games the other night, so I'm wondering if maybe she's a genius or something that Bobbi doesn't want anyone to know about."

"You mean, just like in that book Mr. Weindell made us read in English?" I asked, catching on. Mr. Wendell was the ninth-grade English teacher, and he usually picked out the most boring books for our book reports. But _The Hidden Treasures_ had been great; about a little girl with inexplicable, superhuman powers kept hidden in a crystal mountain cave to shield her from government agencies who wanted to use her for their own purposes. The book was one of my favorites now, and I even had a copy of it on the shelf in my room.

"Yeah! Except that Kerry is younger than the girl in the book," Claudia agreed. "And more mysterious. The girl in the book was pretty open with everyone, eager to learn about the outside world and desperate for human contact. But Kerry isn't. When she isn't behaving perfectly and talking about Bobbi like she's some kind of angel—which I just found out is another tactic abused kids sometimes use to protect their abuser—she's pretty quiet. And that's not normal for someone her age." Claudia tapped the book thoughtfully, the popcorn seemingly forgotten.

I scribbled that down in my notebook, where we'd just spent an hour recording everything we could remember since Claudia's first job with the Battista family. In my other notebook, Claudia had been writing down the most interesting facts we'd found in the library books. We'd filled several pages in each book already. We fell silent then, and I looked around. I spotted Claudia's latest painting, a fantastic piece that I could hardly describe because of the detail and depth, which seemed to mostly need the border around the edges finished.

"So do you have another job lined up for Kerry?" I asked Claudia.

"Bobbi asked me to be a regular sitter while she answers questions about her friend's death," Claudia replied absently.

"You think it might be possible Bobbi had something to do with her friend's death?" I asked, eyes wide. "I know dealing with this stuff can't be easy, so maybe Bobbi…killed her friend and made it look like a suicide? I don't know…"

"I don't, either, but I don't think that's what happened," Claudia replied. "I saw a lot of emotion in Bobbi's eyes when she told me—"

"Was one of them grief?" I interrupted.

"I don't _know_. I was more concerned about Kerry's black eye."

"Oh." I felt helpless, stuck—what could we _do_?

Claudia's phone rang. I jumped, startled. Claudia reached over to her bedside table to answer it, and I lunged for the popcorn, which was about to fall off the bed. I caught it as Claudia said, "Hello?"

I couldn't hear the other person, no matter how hard I strained, but I crossed all of my fingers (almost dropping the popcorn bowl in the process, forgetting I'd been holding it) and hoped it was Bobbi.

"Tomorrow evening? Yes, Mrs. Marshall; I'll call you back."

I deflated. When Claudia hung up, we spoke at the same time. But before either of us could form a comprehensible word, the phone rang again.

"Bobbi," Claudia mouthed, when she'd answered and covered the mouthpiece. "Yes, right…yes, I'll be there."

"Tonight at six," Claudia informed me when she'd hung up again. "But I think we should go there early."

"We?" I repeated.

"Yeah. It's getting dark now, so by the time we get there we'll be concealed. I think we ought to do a little investigating before I'm actually supposed to be there…you know, see what happens when the two of them are alone."

"You mean, you think we should go _spy_ on them? Won't they see us?"

"We'll be _outside_, Emily. And we'll dress in dark clothes, so it'll be even harder for them to see us. Besides, Bobbi wouldn't dare hurt Kerry while I'm there, so the obvious answer is to see—_without_ them seeing _us_, of course—how they act when they're alone together."

"I don't know, Claudia…spying is illegal," I replied doubtfully.

"So is child abuse. And there won't be any way to know for sure unless we spy. And maybe Bobbi's just a really good big sister Kerry actually adores and Kerry is just a typical, clumsy little kid. We don't know anything yet."

"Okay, okay. I'm coming. But if something goes wrong, it's on you."

"If you say so," Claudia replied, picking up a black sweater from her floor (she'd hardly managed to clean it in her newfound maturity) and rifling through her closet for her black sweatpants.

Darn. I'd been hoping telling Claudia she'd get the blame if we were caught would prove she was bluffing or talk her out of it.

* * *

"I can't tell whether or not I'd describe that place as beautiful or intimidating," I admitted, as we crept through the trees that surrounded the Battista property. Through the tall pines, we could see the huge mansion. Well, we couldn't actually see the mansion; it was too dark. But the big windows that shone warm golden light across the huge yard and illuminated the snow swirling in the cold wind made it obvious that there was a mansion there. A gorgeous green pine wreath with a red tartan ribbon and red 'berries' hung on the front door, and Claudia mentioned that there seemed to be even more presents under the tree than she remembered.

"And I can't tell whether or not I think this is really cool, really stupid, or really brave," Claudia muttered in reply. "Come on, let's hurry. I'm supposed to be here in thirty minutes."

"You _are_ here," I muttered, hoisting myself over the low stone wall surrounding the yard. "And so am I, and neither of us should be."

We crept up to the house slowly. A long, straight line of snow-covered bushes lined the base of the house, and I felt them scrape at my snow pants as I leaned over to peer into the window.

"Library?" I whispered, ducking and gesturing with my head to Claudia. We peered over the windowsill covered in snow and into a room that could only be described with the one word. A marble fireplace with a cheerful blaze sat directly across from the window, framed by tall, thick wooden shelves set into the walls. The shelves were lined with books. Bobbi sat in a rocking chair with several books on the table beside her, her lap covered in a small blanket. A cup of hot, steaming cocoa sat next to the books on the table, and Kerry was nestled into Bobbi's lap. We couldn't hear anything, but I assumed Bobbi was reading to Kerry by the way both seemed focused on the open book in Bobbi's hands and the way Bobbi's lips moved. Kerry looked like she was almost asleep.

"I didn't know they had a cat," I said, my voice still a whisper. A beautiful, fluffy white kitten with emerald eyes was sitting sleepily on a colorful carpet in front of the fireplace.

"Um…Emily?"

"What?"

"Did you know they had a dog?"

"No…"

"_Grrrrr_..."

* * *

**Author's Note: Maybe a lame end to Three, but here it is. Told in Emily's point-of-view, too. I'm usually awful with POV and end up telling the chapters from the other character's POV, so if I did, please tell me where so I can fix it! I hate having mistakes in my work, and I'm sometimes too tired to notice them. In case it's confusing, the last little bit of this chapter is when the girls (Emily and Claudia) are spying on Bobbi and Kerry through a window when a guard dog (it IS a mansion, after all!) finds them.**

**By the way, nothing I am writing about in this story is taken from any other book, so this is in no way to be used as a reference for dealing any real child abuse problem. Also, I don't recommend using Claudia's technique (spying) and talk to an adult if you suspect something wrong! I'm just making up what I can for this story, and I'm making it as real as I can. Books I mentioned in this chapter I also made up (and the **_**Hidden Treasures**_** story I mentioned is a little like the book I'm actually trying to write. Good luck to me!) (Alone At Ninety Foot is a real book, though, and a great one!) And thanks again for the reviews! For once, people are reviewing more than I update!**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

"Claudia? Honey, are you awake?"

I opened my eyes and squinted against the bright sunlight streaming in through my window. I glanced blearily at my clock as I pulled myself into a sitting position. Seven-thirteen A.M.

"What is it?" I asked, when my door opened. My mother poked her head in, saw that I was sitting up, and closed the door behind her. She took a seat at the end of my bed in silence.

"Honey, where were you last night? We called your phone and you didn't answer. And you didn't look at us or speak when you came home, almost an hour past curfew. Are you in trouble?"

_What counts as 'trouble,' Mom? Sneaking onto private property? Peering into other people's windows? Assuming a teenager working her ass off for the sake of a little girl barely old enough to talk is abusive?_

"I was with Emily, and then I had a baby-sitting job at the Battista house," I told her honestly. I left out the details. It wasn't like Mom would understand, anyway. And unless Janine had told Mom the details I'd told her were confidential, Mom was just being parental and I had nothing to worry about. Even so, I kept my fingers crossed under my blanket.

Even I was surprised at how we'd managed to escape the previous night. I'd brought a granola bar with me (I was actually getting tired of eating Oreo cookies with Kerry!) and thrown it as hard as I could. With the dog (a giant, muscular breed with sharp teeth and a spiked collar) distracted, Emily and I had run as fast as we could.

I'd arrived back to the Battista house later only to find that our footprints had disappeared and the dog was nowhere in sight. Kerry had been a perfect angel, and Bobbi hadn't mentioned it. I thought it was a little weird, since I'd supposedly been caught on camera going through their things, and then footprints appeared outside the one ground-floor window with light coming from it. But I didn't know how my footprints had disappeared, and I wasn't about to mention that I'd gone through their things and why I hadn't been confronted yet since it was all on tape. That would be stupid. Mom seemed to accept my pathetic little explanation and left with only a nod in my direction.

I expected Janine or my father to mention it, but neither did. Eventually I decided to put it out of my mind and pretend Mom had been paying more attention than usual to us and had noticed that I spent a lot more time away from home than I used to.

I fell asleep again and stayed that way for a while. When I woke up next, I took a shower, ate breakfast, and remembered just as I was rushing for the phone that I'd forgotten to call Mrs. Marshall back the night before, and that she needed a sitter for that night.

"Hello?" I asked.

"Claudia? This is Bobbi Battista," the person on the other end of the phone call said. "I just wanted to let you know that I may not need you today or tonight. The officers on the case think the majority of the questions have been answered, so I shouldn't need to spend so much time away from home. But I still have final exams coming up, so if I may, I need someone to watch Kerry tomorrow afternoon while I'm in school."

"You'll be in school on the day before Christmas Eve?" I repeated, remembering the way Emily and I had read that abusive people sometimes made up stories to cover their tracks.

Bobbi laughed. "Yes. I have two sets of tests left until I graduate, and after tomorrow, just one. So…are you available?"

"Yes, I am," I said, figuring Bobbi's tests were part of a graduation program I didn't understand. _If_ the tests were real at all.

Bobbi gave me the details and hung up. Then I called Mrs. Marshall back and told her I could sit for her daughters that night. She didn't seem to notice it had taken me thirteen hours to figure out whether or not I could do so. And when I hung up, I frowned. Something didn't seem right, and I couldn't figure out right away what it was. When I'd cleaned up my cereal bowl and was brushing my teeth, it hit me. For one thing, if Bobbi's friend had really died, why was Bobbi so calm about it? Why wasn't she crying? She'd spent the previous evening reading to her little sister, not crying her eyes out. That's what I'd done when Stacey died. I spent the first month miserable and almost entirely alone. For another, how convenient was it for Bobbi to call and tell me she wouldn't need me today just as I remembered I didn't know if I could watch Kerry or not because of Mrs. Marshall? It seemed like she knew exactly what I was thinking.

_Then again, how could she? When my friend died, I was devastated. I didn't talk to anyone, and I couldn't eat. I barely slept. And I doubt I could have tolerated children when I was grieving. Maybe being in Bobbi's situation makes a person strong enough to cope for the kid's sake, especially when you've basically lost both parents already. But maybe that's what Kristy's problem was, too. She wasn't particularly close to Stacey, but I doubt the death and the divorce made her life easy. Maybe that was why she broke up the BSC._

But something still didn't make sense. Maybe I'd solved Kristy's mystery, but I still hadn't found out what was really going on with the Battista family, or why Bobbi seemed psychic.

Now, it seemed, I had even more to figure out than before.

* * *

"Thank you for coming, Claudia," Mrs. Marshall said. "The girls have had supper and they can have ice-cream for dessert. Bedtime is at nine-thirty, and Nina has some math homework she might need help with. I'll be home by ten at the latest."

I nodded. I scooped out three bowls of ice cream and we sat at the table, Eleanor practicing writing the alphabet with her crayons and Nina working with her addition homework. When the girls had brushed their teeth, they each put up a fuss about going to bed. And as weird as it was, it felt good to hear them whine. Constantly being around a kid who never whined, protested or argued was nice, but creepy. In any case, Nina and Eleanor were both asleep when their mother returned. She paid me and I walked home, thinking.

Kerry was a little angel. It was nice, but weird. And Nina and Eleanor were angelic, but not perfect. Kerry kind of gave me the creeps, and the Marshall girls didn't. Kerry always did what she was told, and sometimes even before she was told to do it. I'd never had to stop her from bouncing on a bed or leaping off the couch. Eleanor had drawn on the walls and Nina threw a tantrum over dessert when I refused to give her a second bowl. It wasn't so bad, considering what we used to go through with Jennifer Prezzioso all the time. And yet, I almost wondered what they'd be like if they knew Kerry. Would they be wilder because they didn't want to be perfect, or would they want to be equal or better than Kerry seemed? I didn't know for sure.

"Claudia, Emily called twice for you," Mom called, as soon as I walked in.

"Okay!" I ran upstairs, stopping only to fill my athletic bottle (a very cool pink and purple streaked jug that fit perfectly into the water bottle holder on a bike) and headed for my phone, curious about why Emily had called twice.

"Claudia, I saw Bobbi and Kerry again!" Emily didn't even wait for me to say 'hello.' "And guess what!"

"What?"

"Well, Bobbi was holding Kerry, and when Bobbi slipped on the ice outside of the mall, she _threw _Kerry!"

"She might have lost her grip," I pointed out. "And anyway, landing on the ice isn't much better than being thrown to safety. Did it look like an accident?" Despite being skeptical, I had to know.

"Yes. But she threw Kerry," Emily repeated.

I felt a little like I was having déjà vu. Talking about this like everything that happened in Bobbi's personal life was our business and a case of abuse wasn't helping anything. It wasn't helping Kerry, for sure. Accidents happened. I'd once broken my leg while baby-sitting, and Jackie Rodowski, the epitome of 'accident,' had thousands, while we watched him. Getting his hand stuck in a drain, knocking things over, locking himself or someone else, usually the family dog or his little brother, into a shed or bathroom, were all things that happened while one of us (BSC members, back when there was a BSC) was baby-sitting. But that didn't make the baby-sitter a child abuser. I pointed this out to Emily.

"Maybe we should go back to the Battista house," Emily suddenly said, surprising me. "Tomorrow's Christmas Eve, so they should be home."

"And risk being eaten alive by Cujo?" I asked incredulously.

"Why didn't you see the dog before, Claudia? Was Bobbi hiding him? Was he a secret? If she didn't want you to know about the dog, maybe she _is_ hiding something. Maybe she's suspicious of everyone and likes to set traps like that. Maybe she knew you'd get suspicious and wanted you to meet the dog. Or get mauled."

"Maybe, but I doubt it. He's a guard dog, and with dogs trained specifically to lead a blind person or guard a fortress, too much affection like you'd give a normal dog can break the training and I don't doubt retraining a dog would be more difficult and expensive."

"It's not like the Battista family can't afford those things," Emily replied.

I sighed. Emily can be a hard person to convince wrong when she thinks she's right. And maybe she was. It didn't matter.

"Yeah. I want to go see the Battista house again. I doubt she'll call so late at night, so maybe tonight would be the best time to go. Tomorrow's Christmas Eve, so I doubt we'll be able to sneak out tomorrow night. Anyway, we should go again," I replied, nodding although Emily couldn't see me over the phone. As I spoke, I was remembering that it had only been a year since the many members of the BSC had been 'snowbound' in Stoneybrook and we faced a lifetime of making it through other obstacles together. _That_ hadn't worked out. I was also remembering my own words, convincing Emily to go with me to look into the Battista house and see how Bobbi and Kerry acted when alone together.

"Okay. Tonight?"

"Yeah. Tonight."

"Is this stupid?"

"Yes."

"Oh. Great. As long as we agree on that," Emily said, with a resigned giggle as she hung up.

* * *

"What did you distract the dog with last time?"

"Granola bar. But this time, I brought dog treats. I borrowed them from Kristy."

"It was lucky you brought that…wait, you spoke to Kristy?"

We edged along through the forest, keeping our back to the houses on the left, only the lights visible through the trees. I hoped nobody saw us and reported us as robbers.

"Yeah. She looked like she didn't even recognize me."

"How did she look?"

"Awful. Exhausted," I replied. "She almost didn't look like Kristy Thomas anymore. She looked so _old_, so different. Can grief do that to a person?" I asked. "I don't remember looking older when my aunt's first baby died, or when Mimi did, even though I _felt_ much older."

"Maybe it's different with divorce," Emily suggested. "Better get those dog treats ready."

"Do you see something?" I asked, peering into the darkness. "I don't…"

"No, but if I know Bobbi, she has more than one dog. And since I don't know Bobbi, I don't want to take any chances."

"Good idea."

With my free hand (the other clutched the brown paper bag I'd put the treats into) I reached down and into the bag, pulling out several brown bone-shaped treats.

"I tasted these things once," I confessed. "When Kristy still had Louie, her first dog. Her brother Sam dared me to eat dog food, and as a reward, a dog treat. It all kind of tasted the same to me. Just like old cardboard. I don't really see why dogs like this stuff."

"They have different tongues, so probably different tastes," Emily replied absently, and I wondered if she was okay. In the past, Emily might have gone on about the way a dog's mind processes the signals it receives from the senses, sounding just like Janine while I stood there, feeling stupid. I didn't have time to ask, though, and I was out of time for wondering whether or not the dog treats would be as much a treat to the guard dogs as the granola bar had been. Luckily, we managed to get all the way to the house with only five of thirty treats hurled into the trees. Again, Emily and I were clothed in black, wearing last year's boots (to avoid being caught if our footprints were found) and headed for the only ground-floor window with light coming from it.

"What do you see?" I asked. We had nestled as close as we could to the house, crouched down in the bushes. Emily was crouched but exerting herself, legs locked into a standing-squat position to peer into the massive window.

"The same library as the other night," Emily replied, her voice barely audible and not much more than a tiny whisper almost silenced by the wind. "Bobbi's got Kerry in her arms, and Kerry looks like she's sleeping. I can't tell. In any case, it's just like it was the other night. Hot chocolate, blanket, rocking chair, fireplace, and lots of books."

When it was my turn to look about five minutes later (shockingly, the dogs were ignoring us now) I reported that Bobbi had returned without Kerry (presumably, the little girl was safe and asleep in her bed, but we didn't know for sure since Kerry's bedroom was on the third floor) and had cuddled into her chair with a book.

"She must reserve all of her studying for when she needs a baby-sitter," Emily whispered, ducking back down moments later. "It looks like she's reading a comic book."

We stayed there, huddled in a bush and under a window for at least an hour, shivering and taking turns reporting on what we saw. Bobbi spent most of her time curled up and reading, moving only twice: once to sip at the steaming cup of cocoa, and once more to gesture to a butler or servant (whoever the snobby-looking man in the suit was) to poke at the fire, which he seemed to do wordlessly. She looked up from her book only once, and it was only when her kitten entered the room. (The cat leapt into Bobbi's lap, and Bobbi didn't even seem to notice. She kept reading.)

When we were a safe distance away (though shivering like crazy!) Emily ended up with the giggles. "I can't believe we did it! We didn't learn anything new, but at least we did it. I can't believe the dogs didn't bug us!"

"And I still have almost a full bag of dog treats left," I added, shaking the bag and reaching in. I held one up in my gloved hand. "Want to try one?"

We laughed until we ended up at what we'd come to call 'The Fork,' which was where her street and mine split into two and where we always separated if we were walking home from school or the mall together. She and I made plans to call each other the next morning, and I felt a little giddy as I walked home. Despite my aching feet (they must have grown since the previous winter) I was happy. I had a steady job, and Bobbi didn't seem to be abusive. Could things get better?

* * *

I read somewhere once that 'optimism and pessimism work like yin and yang.' I didn't really understand it then, but now I think I get it. When things seem to be great, things will inevitably worsen. Most people (the optimistic ones, I assume) probably think it the other way around—when things are bad, they will eventually be good. But understanding that only helped to confuse me in the new situation I had, which I didn't even know about Bobbi called me the next afternoon and asked me to come over.

I was certain she'd finally found my footprints (though she wouldn't know who the other set belonged to, and wouldn't be able to identify me since I was now, thankfully, wearing this year's winter boots and they didn't match the prints of my old ones) and wanted to ask me about it, and had I been right, I'd have wished I was wrong. However, that situation might have seemed pleasant compared to the one Bobbi wanted to discuss.

"What's with the guards?" I asked, when Bobbi let me in and led me through the house and into the den. (She'd never given me a tour of the house, and had never shown me any other room than the den.) We seated ourselves on the pristine white couch (_pristine_ was becoming one of my new favorite words to describe the Battista den) and Kerry, oblivious to us and watching TV in the kitchen (where a uniformed woman was standing as if at attention) was having lunch.

"As our regular sitter, we have a situation to discuss," Bobbi replied, her voice curt. "Last night, intruders on our property poisoned several of our dogs. Five of them."

"What?" I asked, feeling as shocked as I looked. Bobbi studied my face closely. I wasn't surprised when one of the guards was looking carefully at my boots. But inside, I felt my guts twisting. _What if the dog treats I used to distract the dogs were poisoned?_

But why would Kristy do that? And what if it wasn't me? But why would they check my boots if they hadn't found the prints? Not many adults had feet about my size, so of course they had to make sure. I kept my gaze shocked but neutral. I kept my fingers crossed.

"No match," the guard said, and I saw Bobbi relax in relief.

When the guard had taken up his place at the door to the den, Bobbi leaned in again. "We're checking everyone we know with a possible foot size match," she told me. "If this person gets past the guard dogs so easily, and can get so close to our windows—the windows to rooms we were _in_, though maybe not at the same time—who knows what they could do once inside? I'm keeping Kerry in the dark about this; she doesn't need to know. I've told her it's a training exercise for when we have our summer party here. But I wanted to make sure you were innocent, and make sure you know baby-sitting jobs here from now on wouldn't be quite so relaxing. If you decide to continue your job with us, I'll raise the pay and provide whatever else you feel is necessary for your jobs here. But I have to add now that each of our guards is trained and armed, and that I trust each but you never know. And it's possible that there could be trouble while you sit here, so I knew you should know this beforehand. It's up to you."

* * *

**Author's Note: The thing with the dog food actually happened to me, though I didn't eat a dog treat afterwards. Just the kibble. And none of my chapters so far have had less than three **_**thousand**_** words! I'm doing better and better! (And I still have motivation for this, though I'm feeling a little less enthusiastic. Criticism and feedback and very much appreciated!)**


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter ****5**

Christmas day is always a holiday I enjoy, even though my parents don't go to church or pray before meals. On Christmas morning, Janine and I got up (even though, at fourteen and seventeen we didn't get up at six A.M. and run around yelling, "Time for presents!") and Mom made a big stack of pancakes while Dad lit a fire in the fireplace, as part of our family tradition. While neither of our parents read to us before bed on Christmas Eve anymore, and nobody turned the radio to WSTO to let Janine and I think Santa was nearing Stoneybrook so we'd go to bed early, and nobody set out milk and cookies and checked that the fire was out, we were all still a little excited. The dishes still on the table, we headed for the living room to open our presents. (We'd opened our stockings the night before, and I'd gotten some jewelry, accessories, and art supplies) and in addition, I got candy (from Janine, definitely not the kind of gift my parents would deem appropriate) and books (mysteries, to my surprise, and from my _parents_!) I got more art supplies, several new canvases, and then, to my confusion, a big box wrapped in silvery paper was placed in front of me.

"What's this?" I asked, opening it. My parents and Janine stood and watched, smiling as though they knew I'd love whatever was in this box.

I suppressed a gasp as I pulled out the contents of the box, wrapped in a soft, pale pink tissue paper, which fell away and floated to the floor, forgotten. I was holding Sapphira, the beautiful antique porcelain doll Mimi had gotten from _her_ parents (my great-grandparents, in other words) when she was just four years old. The doll had been kept on a high shelf in Mimi's bedroom cabinet since before I'd been born. Sapphira had very pale Caucasian skin, pale blonde hair, and pale blue eyes. She wore a shimmery blue dress with flowery white lace at the collar, sleeves and hem, and wore little white tights, shiny black leather shoes, and a blue ribbon in her shiny, long hair. This was something incredibly special. This was a doll Mimi had always treasured; never letting any of her childhood friend near it, brushing the doll's silken hair every day, making sure the ribbons on her dress and the shoes on her feet were perfect and shiny.

And Sapphira looked a lot like Kerry, I suddenly realized.

"Mimi's doll?" I asked, looking up.

"You've matured much faster in the last three years than some people ever do," my father said, in his best 'speech' voice, "and we thought the best way to show we trust you and are so proud of you would be to entrust Sapphira to you."

_Kerry really does look a lot like this doll,_ I thought, looking at Sapphira.

"Thank you," I managed, holding the doll as though afraid looking at her would break her. I'd never had something so delicate before.

_Maybe this was how Bobbi felt when she first realized she had to take care of Kerry,_ I thought. _Maybe it's a little like taking care of a child_.

I took my gifts to my bedroom and put them all on my dresser. Cradling Sapphira, I wondered where I could put her where she'd be safe. My dresser was covered in makeup and jewelry, and now Christmas gifts, and it was full of my clothes. My closet was full of clothes _and_ shoes. And a box of markers, paper, toys and books that I used to bring with me on baby-sitting jobs when the BSC was still one of Stoneybrook's best inventions. I quickly closed my closet door.

I turned around and scanned my bedroom. My bookshelf was packed full of books, CDs, and DVDs. My small TV, stereo, and DVD player were on top. My fridge had a streaked vase with a flower on top, and my nightstand was so small the lamp and alarm clock on it took up most of the surface space. The drawer and doors in the nightstand were full of my school books, which we took home whenever we had a long break (and my essay about the meaning of Christmas was in there, too, slipped neatly between the pages of one of my English textbooks) and my bed was no place for an antique.

"How about here?" I asked, spotting my easel. I always keep my easel in the corner beside my closet, and I always keep a small table next to the easel to hold the paints and other art supplies I can't fit into the part of the easel most artists can fit their paints into. I slipped a glass bowl over Sapphira, figuring I'd eventually work on the fruit bowl painting and get carried away, splattering paint everywhere. It didn't happen often that I was too wrapped up in a painting to notice if I was splattering a wall or my mirror (which now seemed to have permanent splat marks on it) but with this painting, one I was particularly proud of (but do you know how long it takes to make a gold or crystal goblet—and I had both—look shiny, or to give a basket the look of woven wood, or to make fruit look shiny, juicy, and full of emotion _and_ keep it looking real? And the fruit was on a black background, but most of the basket was on a white tablecloth, so I couldn't get away with black flecks of paint on a pear or not painting the shadows.)

When Sapphira was safe and I'd cleaned my room up a little, I worked for several hours on my painting, finishing the black and white around the fruit and adding a border around the edge of the canvas, in a creamy, sandy beige color. I was happy to work on it, since I hadn't in several days and the urge to paint had been growing. (Most people probably don't understand, but it's like there's an inexplicable energy in me that can only be released when I'm painting or doing something similar to that.) Besides, my painting was due in class the first Monday after Christmas, which was only a couple of days away. And, as guilty as I felt about it, I admitted a break from thinking about Kerry all the time was nice. Talking constantly about Kerry and Bobbi wasn't helping anyone, and there was nothing we hadn't done already to help. It had only poisoned five dogs, now being treated and hesitantly expected to recover fully, in a fancy veterinary hospital somewhere. And we'd only found out, after two risky nights of spying and trespassing, that Bobbi liked comic books. We hadn't seen her do _anything_ that was abusive in any way.

And yet, Emily just couldn't let the subject drop.

I had only an inch or two left to paint of the border when my phone rang, and, in surprise, my brush slipped from my canvas and, thankfully, into thin air. (Had it slipped in any other direction than off the canvas, I'd have had to repaint part of the tablecloth. Or maybe part of a banana hanging from the basket. Do you know how hard it is to give an apple or a grape the perfect, dull shine or slight transparency most people don't even notice? Or how hard it is to paint the shadow of a banana?) Three small droplets of beige splattered onto the glass covering Sapphira, and I breathed a sigh of relief, glad I'd thought to put her into a protective cover, and ran for the phone as it rang for the third shrill time.

"Hello?"

"Is this a bad time?" Emily asked. "You sound annoyed."

"Oh…yeah; the phone rang and scared me," I admitted. "I almost ruined my painting. And Merry Christmas to you, too."

Emily laughed. "Sorry about that. Merry Christmas. Did you get anything nice?"

"Art supplies and jewelry, mostly," I said, turning to look at my reflection in my mirror. "Oh, and I got a new headband this morning. Black," I added, catching sight of it in the mirror. It was black and printed with white flowers, which looked great against the long, black and white floral skirt I was wearing and the black tank top. I have three holes in each of my ears, and I'd replaced my usual silver rings (I hadn't been wearing my weirdest jewelry since Stacey's death, though even I wasn't sure why) with white hoops. I'd washed my long, 'silky' (according to old friends and now Emily) black hair and pulled it back with the headband, and put on a little makeup. I still looked like the Claudia Kishi I'd been when Stacey died; a Japanese girl with clear skin and almond-shaped eyes, and an outfit most people would consider either too dark or too weird for Christmas day. Emily went on for a few moments about the things she'd gotten—books and CDs, mostly, which were things my parents usually didn't buy. And when at last Emily's sentences started trailing off, like a toy with dying batteries, I took a deep breath and asked why she'd called, knowing she hadn't called on Christmas Day to talk about presents and turkey dinners. "And a doll." I explained Sapphira and her special meaning.

"Well…okay. I know you wanted a break from talking about the Battista family, but I have to know, since you forgot to tell me…when Bobbi warned you about the poisoned dogs, did you agree to go back and watch Kerry again?"

"Yes…" I replied, unsure of where she was going with that. I cradled the phone against my left ear with my shoulder and used my right hand to work on the border. "Why? Did something else happen? Did they figure out where the poison came from?"

"No, not that I know of," Emily replied. "I'm guessing Kristy's treats poisoned them. Speaking of which, what are you going to do about that?"

"What _can_ I do that won't let everyone know _I_ helped poison the dogs? I can't let them know I saw something, or know something, when anything of the sort would tell them I was also in the area and even on the same property when I shouldn't have been?"

"And why hasn't there been anything in the paper about this? A family as wealthy as they are would probably publicize this stuff, right? And they've never mentioned the other set of footprints." Emily hesitated, but it was one of those silences when you know the other person in the conversation isn't done talking, but probably trying to think of what to say next. "I was just wondering because if you do go back, you should probably act nervous, like someone who would poison the guard dogs to a family already in danger could burst in at any time to kidnap the child you've been picked to watch."

"Yeah," I replied tiredly. "I know."

I really didn't want to be talking about this. In Emily's silence, I finished the border on my painting and went over it all again, this time more quickly to make sure the white of the canvas would be darkened. I cleaned off my brush and sat on my bed, admiring the canvas and waiting for Emily's reply.

"What can we do now? We can't just sit here and talk about it, and we definitely can't go back to spy on them again. Too many guards. And we're not getting anywhere, anyway. As weird as the Battista situation is, I'm beginning to wonder if anything is actually _wrong_ in that situation at all. Besides Bobbi's stress level, I mean." Emily's voice had softened, and I could hear someone in the background from her end of the phone line in a kitchen, and by the sounds of it, starting a chicken supper.

At last, Emily sighed. It was one of those heavy, thoughtful, resigned sighs, the ones my father sometimes uses when he's made a decision he doubts anyone will like. And I knew I'd judged her sigh right by her next words. "Maybe we should tell someone…?"

"You just said you were starting to doubt anything was wrong," I reminded Emily. "And to be honest, I've been doubtful about all of this from the very start. While some of it is a little…strange, I don't think any of it really points to child abuse. How did we even start on that, anyway? Kerry falls twice, and suddenly we're sure Bobbi's some kind of psychotic, twisted person who would hurt her own little sister? Even a stress load like Bobbi's wouldn't cause a person to snap in that way. I don't think so, anyway."

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," Emily replied, her voice losing the doubtful, tired tone and taking on an angry, annoyed, accusing tone. "Would anyone have believed me if I'd told them when I was three and locked into a tiny attic for weeks at a time? Would they care if the only daylight I saw came through a grimy window high in the wall hidden by overgrown weeds? Would any of them have tried to free me from that dank basement or that stuffy, musty attic? Would any of them have bothered to give me a second thought? No! And that would have been if I'd told them, or if anyone heard my screams! Can you imagine what it could be like for Kerry? She's not telling anyone either!"

I was silent, shocked speechless by Emily's revelation. Before I could speak, much less put two coherent thoughts together, she hung up.

_So that's why she's been so into this_, I thought, hanging up slowly without even realizing what I was doing. I felt numb and dazed. _She was abused, too! And I'll bet nobody knows. Is that still happening?_

Whatever the case, I suddenly felt overwhelmed. I didn't know what to do about either situation. Suddenly, and possibly brought on by seeing my Kid-Kit in the closet, I suddenly missed my BSC friends and their support and opinions more than ever before.

* * *

I spent the next three days or so in what felt like a lifeless daze. Bobbi called on me only once, but Kerry was angelic (as always) and Emily didn't call back or return any of my calls. She never answered the phone, either, and when I went to her house, or when her mother answered the phone, Emily was always in the shower or out at the mall or a friend's house. Never my house, though. Never with me at the mall. I didn't know what to do, and I was extremely glad that there was an art class on Monday (which was also the beginning of the last week of winter vacation) to distract me.

My art teacher seemed to love my painting, which Mom had driven me over with in the car, and made some of the nicest comments he gave anyone in the advanced class. He kept talking about the way the fruit captured things like _nobility_, stolidity, _gravity_ and _sorrow_. I didn't understand most of what he was talking about, but when he said the way the drooping banana reminded him of the way people were always trying to be unique and different and just like everyone else and how always trying to find your place socially and rising up from one 'social level' to the next could hold you down, I felt pretty proud, even though capturing the things he saw (and his pointing them out seemed to cause the other students to clap for me!) hadn't been intentional.

"I hope you'll consider entering it in the art show next spring, Claudia. I don't know how you manage to do it, but capturing emotion and ideas are difficult enough, and you managed to do it with this painting." He looked genuinely impressed.

I nodded and happily looked over the other work in the classroom. The other students were mostly older than I was, but when one of the women told me she'd been painting for fifty years and still hadn't reached my level of skill, I felt fantastic. _Her_ canvas, which was just as big as mine, was only about seventy-five percent painted. And I honestly couldn't tell what the painting was supposed to be of. But the woman told me her daughter had gotten married over the Christmas holidays, and that her son had brought his new wife over with the news that she was pregnant. With all of that and Christmas itself happening, I could definitely understand how a painting could be neglected. Even so, I was pleased that she got a pleasant review for her work. Despite being unable to tell for sure what the painting was supposed to be, I could tell she'd done a good job.

One painting in particular caught my eye. Most of the paintings weren't masterpieces, but this was the kind that belonged behind glass in a gallery or museum. It was of two little kids, a boy and a girl, playing in a bright green field full of yellow flowers on a sunny day, with a blue sky and fluffy white clouds above them. Both were dressed up and looked a little like kids did a hundred years ago. The painting had shadows, and depth—and even though I wasn't sure the painting conveyed emotion, as the assignment had been, I thought the painting was supposed to depict happiness, since I felt a sad longing for sunshine and warmth and the smell of flowers just looking at it.

Most of the paintings were of Christmas trees, decorated and shiny with presents beneath. Some had fireplaces of shelves of books. Some of the paintings were of houses decorated for Christmas, windows casting a golden glow onto the snow outside. I figured those ones were to portray homesickness or the welcome warmth of being inside, safe with family at the happiest time of year, the smell of food around you, especially compared to being outside in the frozen, dark, desolate world. Or maybe they were to give the person looking at the art an idea of an ideal Christmas, or an ideal family—or friendship, or maybe even the way it feels to give gifts and receive them.

Another picture that caught my eye was so well-done that I felt mine was pretty stupid compared to it. It was a painting of something not bright and shiny, like most people might expect at this time of year, but a picture of desolate despair—a dark, dim alley with an overflowing Dumpster at one end, pinched between two grimy, graffiti-decorated stone walls. It was so dark and realistic that I could almost hear the vague rat shapes painted into the shadows scurrying around amidst the scattered trash. I felt hope, looking at it—was it the way the streetlight illuminated just into the alley and cast the rest in shadow, or the way a human silhouette sitting in the curb with the head in his hands that depicted that things could always be worse? I didn't know, but I _did_ know it was a very powerful painting.

I felt a little better after that class. Art always makes me feel better; especially when I'm not the only one in the class doing my best to actually meet assignment requirements. (Words I never thought I'd even understand, much less be able to use about myself!) And seeing other people's work, and feeling the power of it, can make a person feel less alone, like someone else out there really understands. That one painting, with that dark alley, was a little like my own situation. Not dark and metaphorical, really. But it was the kind of painting that was dark and realistic and blunt and truthful, even when all around it was paintings (and real situations) of pretty things. Life was like that, too. Some good, some bad. Some optimism, some pessimism. Like my life, which was pretty good even if Janine sometimes annoyed me, was better than the life of an abused kid. Like Kerry, or like Emily. Some good, some bad.

Maybe I didn't know yet what to do about Kerry or Emily, but at least I knew I wasn't alone when I felt helpless and trapped and miserable.

* * *

**Author's Note: I feel like this story is dragging on and on without really going anywhere. Maybe it's because of the chapter length. If anyone else feels this way, please let me know! I need ideas on what could happen next. I do have one, actually, and I'll use it if I don't have any other outside input on this, but I don't think Ill be able to write it well…and speaking of which, the paintings described in this chapter are either real or pieces of others I've seen, and the scene in the last 'painting' was one I'm using in my original, hopefully published one day, story, so PLEASE don't use it. It's actually copyrighted...oh, and**** Claudia's fruit painting (and the words I used to describe it) was all the creation/use of the Sims Pet Stories Game. It's true! Inspiration for the last painting description (on Christmas Day; Merry Christmas!) came from "Demonflame" of deviantART. :)**


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter ****6**

**POV:** **Emily**

I felt like a real jerk. Not for ignoring Claudia's calls, but because I'd yelled at her in the first place. My problems weren't Claudia's fault, and I knew I wasn't helping anyone when I wasn't talking to the only friend I had now. Kelly had moved away, something to do with her father's law firm transferring him to a new location, and now that I didn't have Claudia to occupy my phone time, and now that I had no new information on Claudia's jobs with the Battista family, I was going crazy. At first I'd been so numb and angry that I had just sat there for at least half an hour, and now, going over everything, I just felt so _alone._ And like a jerk.

"Why don't you call her?"

I looked up. I'd been sitting on my bed, my legs curled up to my chest, deep in thought, and clutching a pillow. My aunt was standing in my open doorway, leaning against it, and watching me. There wasn't much to see (I have brown hair and dark eyes, and I usually keep my hair shoulder-length and pulled into a ponytail) but I knew she could tell I was upset.

"How did you know?" I asked.

"I heard you talking to Claudia the other day, and while I'm sure I've no idea what this fight is about, I do know that if you feel bad about it, Claudia probably does, too."

I sighed. After a moment of thought, I shrugged. "We aren't really fighting. We're just not talking. I got mad the other day and yelled a little, but I wasn't really mad at Claudia. Just…a lot of other stuff, and I guess it's all just building up together."

Confused, my aunt waited for the inevitable explanation she knew I was about to give, whether she actually knew why Claudia and I weren't speaking or not. And I doubted she did.

I explained everything I could remember about the Battista situation, excluding the fact that Claudia and I had gone over to their house (trespassed) and spied, poisoning five dogs in the process. Even though that hadn't technically been our fault, the poison wouldn't have been a problem if Claudia and I hadn't used to treats to distract the dogs.

"Child abuse is a pretty serious allegation, Emily," my aunt replied, looking both troubled and serious. "And from what evidence you've told me about, I'm not sure alerting the authorities is even the best choice. I know we should if there's even the slightest concern, but finding a red tissue could mean anything. It could mean someone had a nosebleed, or spilled red paint, or even ketchup. It may not mean someone was cut on purpose. And a child falling down the stairs, although the explanation was used twice, is very possibly the truth. You fell down the stairs at least three times before you turned four, and it was before we realized you were somewhat near-sighed."

I shrugged, picking up the glasses I use for reading. "Yeah…"

"And if all you've said is true, Bobbi may have other girls coming over to watch Kerry, correct? Maybe Kerry was playing and got a bruise Bobbi couldn't quite explain, but saying she didn't know how a kid was hurt when in her care would also look bad, wouldn't it? Maybe another sitter caused the bruise and told Bobbi she fell down the stairs. There are almost endless possibilities about bruises and children, Emily. Bruises aren't exactly hard to get. I had maybe twenty bruises in a year as a child. Sometimes more."

"What about black eyes?"

"I'd think those are harder to get, since most people instinctively shield their heads when they fall. However, it's possible a black eye could be caused by a fall down the stairs." My aunt spoke with confidence, but she didn't look quite so sure.

"But I told Claudia everything," I replied. "Well, not everything. But a lot. What if she tells the other kids when school starts?"

"If Claudia was as good a friend as she's seemed to be, she wouldn't," my aunt replied. "But if it worries you, talking to her and making sure she understands what you told her was in confidence should break the ice and help you both feel better."

"And not talking to her isn't helping anyone, anyway," I muttered, feeling like I'd just agreed to save the world. "Least of all me."

My aunt closed my door behind her, giving me privacy.

I stared at the phone for what felt like forever, but when I picked it up at last, I still didn't know what to say. So I hung up, picked up a notebook and pen, and sat back on my bed.

I titled it _TOP TEN THINGS TO SAY TO CLAUDIA KISHI_.

And for at least half a minute, I just sat there, wondering what to write. I knew I could start off with an apology, so I wrote that down on the paper. But it wasn't enough.

In the end, it was all I'd written down, though, so I moved over and picked up the receiver again. Before I could change my mind, I dialed Claudia's number and waited.

An unfamiliar voice answered on the fourth ring.

"Hello, Claudia Kishi's phone," it said.

"Hi…um, this is Emily Bernstein," I replied. "Will Claudia be back soon?"

"Yes, in about ten minutes. She had an art class," the other voice said, and I knew then that Janine, Claudia's genius older sister, had answered Claudia's phone. "Should I tell her you'll call back?"

"Yes, please," I answered, and hung up as quickly as I could. Janine is one person I hate talking to. She corrects everything anyone says, even if you think you've just spoken in perfect English. She seems to know everything (her IQ is almost 200, which makes her one of the smartest people on the _planet_, and I'm not kidding!) and she won't pretend it isn't true. She never hesitates to remind someone if they made a mistake when speaking, and she uses words so long I wonder if Claudia ever feels like she lives with a dictionary. Or, as Claudia once said, "A dictionary that dresses like a nerd."

I waited for several minutes (fifteen, actually) before Claudia called me back. I wondered as I answered whether she had spent five minutes actually sitting there, wondering what to say to me, or whether Janine had forgotten to be perfectly punctual and guessed at what time Claudia should be home. I didn't know, or care, really. As long as Janine, future physicist, wasn't calling me back, it was all good. (I don't actually know what Janine will be when she grows up, but she's been taking college courses since she was fourteen or fifteen, so I do know that it'll probably be something with a name I can hardly pronounce, much less understand. I wonder sometimes if Claudia's parents, like she used to think, would be disappointed if Janine ended up a NASA scientist and Claudia ended up an artist or professional baby-sitter.

"I'm sorry," I apologized, as soon as I picked up the phone.

"Before you say anything else, I want to let you know that I don't plan on telling anyone else what you said," Claudia replied, and I let out a sigh of relief I hadn't even known I was holding. I felt myself relax, as if I was a balloon that had just been popped.

"I know," I lied. "But I'm still sorry. I just got so upset…Kerry's situation, if there is one, just really got to me. I felt like it was my own situation, in a way. And when you didn't believe me, I just felt like, what if Kerry was me and I couldn't tell anyone what I was going through, just like Kerry probably can't? And what if someone could have ended my suffering and didn't, because they were afraid of being wrong?"

"I know," Claudia replied, as if imitating me. "And once I figured that out, I realized something else. If you can tell me everything you can about your situation, I'll know what to look out for when I go back. It might even help _you_ to have someone to talk to."

"Yeah…" I said, but I wasn't sure I'd ever be able to tell Claudia what had happened to me. I knew I'd already told her a lot, but it would be awkward to openly tell her anything, or everything, else.

"You don't have to, if you don't want to. I understand. But I need your help. I have a job for Kerry this afternoon, and Bobbi asked me to take her to the mall so she can pick out a new dress for the New Year's party at their mother's work."

"Why would you need my help?" I was confused.

"Maybe because Bobbi mentioned her mother, which she doesn't do often, and told me when she called that the party is for her mother's place of work. She happened to mention that the party is at the EGS tower, which happens to be an office building for a local bank. And Bobbi told me, on the first day and I think once since then, that her mother is a _lawyer_, not a banker."

"She's getting her lies confused?" I asked.

"Possibly. She _could_ be telling the truth. But I don't know. It seems like she's gotten her lies, if that's what they really are, confused three times now."

"And that seems too big a coincidence to ignore," I replied, agreeing.

* * *

I met Claudia at the mall.

I didn't greet her, though. Kerry was with her, and Claudia had mentioned that Kerry seemed pretty honest with Bobbi. The last thing we needed was for Kerry to tell Bobbi that Claudia was hanging out with one of Kerry's ex-sitters while watching the girl.

My job was to act as normal as possible, and keep an eye on Kerry to make sure she was okay. If Claudia turned her back and Kerry suddenly let the fact that she was limping show, I was going to make a video of it with Claudia's mother's cellular phone. I was also going along because Bobbi had apparently warned Claudia that another of the dogs had been poisoned, and since neither of us had been there, we knew someone else was after something in that house—possibly Bobbi, possibly Kerry, possibly their mother…or, much more simply, maybe someone was after their belongings.

"No offense, but I doubt it," Bobbi had said. "Robbers wouldn't, unless they were very stupid, want us to know they were about to rob this place. They wouldn't leave a trail of poisoned dogs behind them for us to care for while they plan the next move. If anything they'd want us to believe the dogs were all still on active duty so nobody would try anything. Only a fool would poison the dogs and walk away, still planning something." Claudia had said that at this point, Bobbi fell silent for a moment. "And anyone who took one good look at this place would see the guards, alarms, and traps and run away."

(Oh, that's right. Bobbi had pointed out that, in the trees around the house, traps had been set. Claudia had sounded breathless and panicked when she told me about this later. The traps weren't the best on the market, but they were definitely effective. Bobbi had shown Claudia nets that fell from concealed spots in the trees when sensors buried underground detected weight – to which Claudia later told me, we were lucky not to have been caught in one – and traps that held and cut into the legs of anything who stepped into the concealed contraptions.)

"We were lucky we weren't caught," Claudia said, when she told me over the phone what she'd seen. "Some of those traps were nasty! She even showed me pictures of one of the last burglars who came too close and got caught in one of the leg traps. He had to have his leg _amputated,_ and he tried to sue them for it! He lost, though. Luckily."

"He lost his leg, and lost the case?" I had asked, in disbelief. "And that's lucky?"

"Well, who knows what he was sneaking onto Battista property for? He could have been a rapist, kidnapper, murderer, robber…anything, and he was trespassing. Why was it someone else's fault he was where he shouldn't have been?"

But anyway, my job at the mall was to make sure nobody else seemed to be following Claudia and Kerry around. (And when Claudia had mentioned that my mother had always said I wasn't home when she called, during our quiet fight, I had shrugged and told her the truth, that I lived with my aunt. And then I'd told her I'd told my aunt what was happening, and Claudia had seemed both relieved and annoyed.) So I felt a little more relaxed, knowing most of my secrets were out, and took a seat on a bench in the mall so I could keep an eye on the entrance and hide when Claudia and Kerry arrived.

I was just beginning to wonder if Claudia had tricked me into coming to the mall and sitting there, scanning the entrance for her, when she arrived. Claudia looked pretty cool, in what I assumed was a simple outfit because of the post-Christmas sales. And the mall was full of people eager to find a good deal. Claudia was wearing dark blue sweats over a pale, sky-blue tank top and matching sneakers, her hair pulled into a high ponytail with a big blue flower holding it in place. Kerry was adorable (as always) in a white silk dress with pink silk at the sleeves, hem, and neck, which were lace to match the tight white leggings and lacy ankle socks over her pink sandals. Personally, I thought it was too cold (still December, after all, and it was only the 28th because it had been three days since our fight, which had erupted on Christmas Day) to wear a dress, but with a pink coat over her dress (and matching pink silk ribbons in her hair) Kerry didn't seem to notice.

"Ohh, isn't she just the sweetest thing?" I heard an elderly saleswoman croon as Claudia and Kerry walked into the mall. Little Kerry was drawing lots of attention, and didn't seem embarrassed. She gave the onlookers of the mall a cute smile, complete with the same straight, white teeth Claudia had described to me as being Bobbi's (though these were smaller, since Kerry was three) and kept pace with Claudia, not stopping to look at chocolate bars, jewelry, or the plastic guide dog for change donations to the charities that help with blind people sitting outside of the (glasses) frame store. She didn't even stop to look at the fish swimming in the huge tank in the middle of the mall, and since these were all things that usually interested children, I felt my suspicion return. Kerry may have been polite and perfect, but she was still human, wasn't she? Children, and even adults, had things that fascinated me. I knew some parents who refused to take their children to malls while they were little because the kids wanted to look at everything and play with everything. But Kerry didn't. She kept her grip on Claudia's hand (I used to wander off while my parents shopped to hide in the clothes racks and play with the toys) and kept pace with her, while most kids wanted to be picked up and carried around, and would whine if they weren't immediately picked up. Kerry, as far as I knew, never whined.

And she proved me right as the day progressed. Although almost everything was shiny and interesting to look at, and Kerry could read sale signs, she didn't show much of an interest in anything. She never asked to look at anything else, answered Claudia's questions of 'What color do you like' and 'Does this look nice' and never resisted when Claudia led her to a different rack or section of girls' clothes. And Kerry never seemed to limp. Her black eye had healed completely (although contrary to my research, since bruised eyes were supposed to take a week or two to heal) and I saw no signs of pain or problem on her face. Claudia and Kerry eventually agreed on a dark green velvet dress with a black sash at the waist and red ribbons for Kerry's hair for the New Year party.

"That seems weird to me. Most people who go to New Year parties drink and have sex, and this one seems family-orientated," a cashier said, when Claudia explained why they were buying such a festive dress after Christmas. The cashier had just spoken my exact thoughts. "But I guess it's a work party, so those are supposed to be more boring."

Claudia shot the cashier a dirty look, calmly explained that she had a child with her and that she'd report him to the store manager for saying such things, picked up the bag, took Kerry's hand, and left the store. I almost expected, like in a movie, to see other customers applauding. Claudia winked at me once she was outside, and I followed her.

Later, over the phone, Claudia told me everything Kerry had told her.

"Nothing out of the ordinary, but she did say she has a loose tooth," Claudia reported. "I asked her why, wondering in the back of my mind whether Bobbi might have hit her and knocked one loose or something, and Kerry just giggled and said, "It's because I'm becoming a big girl, silly!" It was so cute."

"She could have been told to say it," I replied grudgingly, but I sighed. "As much as I hate to admit it, I think you've been right all along. I don't think there's anything wrong, weird, or anything else out of the ordinary about the Battista family."

"The part with Bobbi raising a kid and the mixed stories could all be true and the result of stress or fatigue," Claudia agreed. "I know it's weird that they've got people after them, but considering the family's wealth, status, and role in prosecuting criminals, even that makes sense. The one poisoned dog wasn't our fault, but I still don't know what to do about that...the other poisoned dogs; Kristy.... But in any case, I think it's safe to back off now and assume Kerry's safe. She's a perfect angel, and Bobbi is nice. I think everything will be all right."

"I think I'd feel better if we weren't just going to forget about it…"

"We won't," Claudia assured me. "But let's not jump all over every little thing that seems out of place, okay? Analyzing the dust, what little there was in there, was making me crazy."

* * *

**Author's Note: No, this story isn't over. I just got tired of having to write out that they were analyzing everything. This chapter was definitely boring (I think it is, anyway) and more of a filler to explain that Emily and Claudia make up and that they'll relax a little. For now…I don't know what future chapters will bring. I'm making this up as I write. In any case, the continued support from the reviewers (eleven reviews on five chapters so far…awesome!) keeps me going, and I, surprisingly, still have motivation for this, even though I don't know where the next chapter (seven, making this one of my longest fics ever!) will go, how it will begin, end, or anything, so if you've any suggestions, good, bad, or other, please review! :)**


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

"_I don't know how to explain it. I just don't think I can do this anymore._"

The words had begun what I thought would be the hardest, most difficult situation I'd ever face in my friendship with Stacey. It was a sunny Friday afternoon, during the early afternoon and beginning of a long weekend. It had began as a good day—Stacey's mother had offered to take us down to the community pool, and Kristy had planned a BSC sleepover pizza party, complete with chips, soda, and movies, for that night. What should have been a great day was spoiled when Stacey made her announcement.

"_Can't do what anymore?" I asked, biting into a chocolate bar._

"_The Baby-Sitters Club. It's too much work. I have a boyfriend now, and we'll be starting high school next summer. We'll have way more homework than we do now, and I just can't keep up with baby-sitting jobs and my homework and everything. My diabetes, the divorce, and remarriage of my father was enough. I just can't do this."_

I had sat up, alarmed, and hit my head on my bed, which I was beneath, trying to find the top half of my new swimsuit.

"_You…want to quit the BSC?" The whole idea was so foreign to me that I sat there for a moment, feeling pretty stunned._

"_I don't want to. I have to." _Stacey had looked down then, looking ashamed. _"I'm really falling behind, Claudia. I used to make pretty good grades. I almost made straight A's before I found out I was diabetic. I wanted my move to Stoneybrook to fix that. I wanted to be at the top of my class again. I want to be a mathematician or something when I grow up. I want to go to college. And I can't study while Eleanor Marshall is sitting on my lap, trying to figure out how to tie her shoes, or while Jamie Newton is wiping a nose full of snot off on my new cashmere sweater. I don't have time to help Melody Korman learn multiplication and I definitely don't have time to be picking up after Jackie Rodowski. I'm sorry, Claudia, but I don't have time for this anymore."_

"Translation: you don't have time for children anymore," I'd said.

"You know what? You're right," Stacey had said, shocking me. "I'm going to be in the ninth grade, and that means I'm going to be in the graduation program in a year. I need to focus all of my energy on what really matters. Kristy can organize all of the car washes, charitable trips to the hospitals, host a summer camp and dancing daycare and all the fundraisers she wants, but I can't be a part of it."

I had felt horrible. Kristy, to be honest, _did_ organize a lot of things like that for the kids we baby-sat for, and yes, she was bossy about it. She was always in charge, and if someone was late, even if they hadn't actually agreed to help, she was livid and made them feel terrible about it. She jumped to conclusions, made assumptions, and gave any late BSC member 'the Look,' as it was called, if even several seconds late. There sometimes didn't seem to be any way to please her. Keeping track of every detail in our jobs, giving up personal information (such as where we'd be and when so Mary Anne could tell who was free when a job came in) and making only two or three dollars an hour _did_ push our nerves a bit. Okay, a lot. (It was why I'd raised my rate to five dollars an hour.)

But I still didn't understand why Stacey would quit. She loved the BSC as much as I did, and had been there, like I had, since the very beginning. But Stacey did quit. She never came back to meetings, refused jobs (but Charlotte Johanssen's mother called on her occasionally, since Stacey was and would always be her favorite sitter) and didn't even ever ask about pizza parties. She came to that pizza party the Friday night that day we were supposed to go to the pool (we didn't; we stayed at my house, in my bedroom talking) just to make her announcement and leave.

Then, two and a half months later, just before her fourteenth birthday (which she said was April the third, which made her death date in early January) she was killed.

The first year anniversary to that date was coming up within a few days, and I couldn't think about much else. I was glad Emily and I weren't talking about the Battista family situation much anymore.

I remembered the day Stacey died as clear as anything else. In fact, I almost felt like I remembered it even more than the day she told me she wouldn't be able to stay in the club.

It had been five-forty on Monday evening when the call came in at the BSC headquarters. It was Stacey McGill's mother, and Kristy was annoyed because Stacey hadn't called. The rest of us sat there, hiding smiles at Kristy's frown, and watched in growing concern as Kristy's expression changed from one of annoyance and anger to one of concern, then such extreme sadness and horror and a hollow, blank emotion I couldn't describe if I spent a week trying. When Kristy hung up, she was _crying,_ something she doesn't do often, but managed to tell us what happened. Stacey had been crossing the street with Normal Hill, an obese seven-year-old boy we used to sit for (they moved away after the accident) and he was moving too slow. A careening bus hit Stacey, who barely managed to shove Normal to safety, and she supposedly died on impact. I hope she did, because the pain of a slow death caused by being hit by a bus would almost make one wish for death. The story was written about in the newspaper twice, and photos of the accident are actually tacked onto my bulletin board now. I couldn't bear to throw them away, but at first I couldn't stand to look at them. I kept them in a drawer with the belongings of Stacey's her mother had given me. It was like when my grandmother, Mimi died, and the portrait I'd painted of her was too painful for me to look at. I put it in several places (under my bed, in my closet, behind my bureau) before putting it in the attic. Now it hangs on my wall as a memory of Mimi, and I love looking at it. It's a pretty realistic portrait, and I love that I finally got Mimi's eyes to reflect the tender examination she seemed to give everything around her. Mary Anne, Dawn, Abby, and even Shannon had burst into tears when Kristy gasped out the story Stacey's mother had given her, and the rest of us sat there, shocked and trying not to cry. Mallory had jumped up and bolted after a paralyzed moment, and Jessi had run out after her. The rest of the meeting passed in a daze, and now, almost a year later, I was feeling guilty that I wasn't missing Stacey more, thinking about her like I did when she was alive.

"It's normal to feel that way," Mary Anne had told us, after a visit to Dr. Reese, a psychologist she saw occasionally. She'd seen her after her house burned down, and Mary Anne came back from the first few sessions after that loaded with information I found useless at the time. Now it seemed to be coming in handy. "She said remembering on a daily basis is normal at first, and slipping up and using the present tense for a few weeks is normal, too. But after a while, when it gets a little easier, and we don't remember things at every moment and feel awful, it's normal to think of other things."

"So it's normal that we slip and say, 'Let's go to your house, Mary Anne,' when the house isn't there anymore?" Abby had asked.

Mary Anne had nodded. "Yes, and it's also normal if after someone dies or divorces that we use present-tense when we should use past."

I was pondering death and divorce when my mind wandered to Kristy. She'd experienced divorce and abandonment. She'd also poisoned five dogs. I'd helped with that, but I hadn't known. She knew.

_What if Kristy reads the paper and figures out that the poisoned Battista dogs were my fault? She could tell someone!_ I panicked before remembering that nothing about the Battista family had ever appeared in the newspaper. _Still, maybe I should talk to her…_

I felt guilty about that, too. When Emily and I fought, I called or went over to her house at least once a day. With Kristy, neither of us called the other anymore. I'd tried at first. It was like we didn't even know each other now. And I'd known Kristy since we were babies. I felt rotten.

_Ease up, Kishi,_ I told myself. _You weren't the one who didn't return calls. You didn't tell your little brother to shut the door in a friend's face. No matter what happened in your life; the miscarriage of your aunt, the death of your grandmother, being sent back a grade, even being accused of cheating on a math test; you never gave up. Kristy has given up. So if Kristy wants to sit at home and sulk because her parents got divorced, that's her business. In fact, if she wants to be a jerk and let clients and children alike down, like when she skipped her softball team practices without notifying the parents, that's great. It just shows that Kristy Thomas didn't ever really have a good reason for picking on late BSC members or anyone else that wasn't absolutely, perfectly punctual. But when Kristy purposely poisons animals, and doesn't care enough to even make sure they survived, then it's my business, too. And I really should call her._

"I'll tell her I borrowed the treats to feed to a client's dog," I said aloud, heading for my phone and, for the first time in several days, forgetting about Stacey, "and it'll be the truth. Besides, Kristy doesn't even know how many treats I fed them. She wouldn't know if I borrowed them to use as the subject for a painting, or if I actually fed them to a dog. Or five."

I dialed Kristy's number and waited. To my shock, Kristy herself answered on the second ring.

"Kristy, do you remember that I borrowed a bag of dog treats from you before Christmas?"

"Yeah," she replied. Her tone gave nothing away.

"I think something was wrong with them," I said, deciding not to tell her right away what happened, or that I still had the bag of poisoned treats in my closet. I didn't know what to do with them yet, but I did know that throwing them out was illegal, since they'd be considered evidence. I was probably also breaking the law, since I knew of a crime (and had helped commit it) and hadn't turned myself in.

"Like what?" Kristy asked, clearly not going to confess to anything right away.

"Well, I have some new baby-sitting clients, and they have a dog," I replied, deciding against telling her they had at least six. Six poisoned dogs, five of which seemed to be Kristy's fault. "I gave him one, and he's in the hospital now. They say he's been poisoned."

"_Poisoned_?" Kristy repeated, her tone full of disbelief, and had it been about anything else, I'd have believed her instantly.

"Yes. And because this family keeps to themselves—" (_That's a definite understatement,_ I thought) "I think the treat was poisoned."

_This is unfair. Anyone could have poisoned that dog. Anyone could have poisoned those treats, come to think of it. Just because Kristy's bitter, doesn't mean she would hurt anyone. But a dog was poisoned when Emily and I weren't there, so it's not like it was definitely our treats…_

But if I expected Kristy to deny anything, I was in for a surprise. She hung up, which I know is a sign of guilt, and I sat there, kind of shocked. But I didn't want to just sit there; I was bored if waiting around. I needed action. I wanted it, desperately.

But I couldn't act alone. I dialed Emily's number.

* * *

"For all the many, many times I've been to this house, I never thought I'd be here undercover," I joked, inching along in the bushes lining Kristy's front yard. Despite the divorce, Kristy's mother had managed to keep Watson's mansion (it wasn't like he couldn't afford another) and Kristy, her mother, and her three brothers still lived there. Emily and I had watched Charlie and Sam leave (for a basketball game, by the sounds of it) and Kristy's mother leave for work (she'd decided to keep working, despite having freely inherited a mansion) and I guessed Kristy and David Michael, who was now eight, were still inside.

"Just stay low, okay? One of the last things I want right now is for Kristy, who has poison at her fingertips, to catch us."

I agreed silently, thankful for my dark clothes, shoes, and hair. The kitchen light came on, bathing the front yard in light, and startled Emily so that she jerked and the snow on the bushes showered down on us, making me shiver and Emily giggle uncontrollably. We remained frozen in our spots (though not literally) and watched as Kristy poured herself a bowl of cereal, handed a bowl to David Michael, and disappeared from sight. Within five minutes, the light had been turned off.

"Now what? Find a window and look in?"

"Yup," I replied, "just like the Battista house. But this place isn't alarmed, Kristy doesn't have any dogs, and hopefully, no guards."

We crept around the house (it was easier this time, since I knew Kristy's house better than I knew Bobbi's) and peered into every window that was lit. We never found Kristy in a library, cuddled up with her little brother in front of the fireplace with a book, or saw her pick him up and carry him up to bed. But that was just the problem; we didn't see Kristy at all, in any of the rooms. We saw David Michael take a seat in the den and turn on the TV, but Kristy didn't come into the room, and David Michael didn't move or get up.

"Nothing ever seems to happen when we spy," Emily complained in a whisper. "Do you think she's expecting us?"

"It's possible, I guess—"

"Well, then you and I should be sure to lay low, because I think I just heard the back door open." Emily sounded sure of this, and I hoped she wasn't joking around about that. Being caught would be bad enough. Being caught by Kristy would be worse.

We stopped moving and crouched, almost flat under the bushes. I hoped the snow that had fallen from the bushes would help conceal us, but I was worried someone would notice the missing snow and bare leaves exposed beneath.

Sure enough, Kristy came walking around the side of the house. She was looking around, evidently suspicious, and we flattened ourselves against the pine needles strewn across the bare, frozen soil. She looked around, but didn't seem to see us. She passed noiselessly, but kept going, around the house. Two, then three times.

When she'd gone around the house again, Emily glanced back at me. She was ahead of me, and looked suspicious. "I guess that proves she's sure someone's here to check on her," she whispered, "and I'll bet the next ten years of my allowance that she knows she's done something wrong. That must be why she's so suspicious."

"We look suspicious, too," I reminded Emily, needlessly gesturing around at the bushes covering us. "And she may not have poisoned the dog treats. I was thinking she might have had them in the garage, and maybe one of her brothers spilled a can of car wax or something like that on them and didn't notice. It's possible."

"Not as possible as some bitter girl who gave poisoned treats to an ex-best-friend," Emily muttered darkly. "I still think Kristy's responsible for what happened, even if you and I were the ones who handed the treat to an unsuspecting dog."

"I feel like we should turn Kristy in," I replied, "but we can't unless we give ourselves up, too, and expose Kerry and Bobbi to the media over a bunch of false accusations."

We crawled along on our stomachs, using only our hands to pull ourselves along. I clamped my mouth shut and ducked my head down to avoid getting a mouthful of branches, and felt my frozen nose (every part of me felt frozen) scrape the ground. I sighed a little, and hoped nobody would photograph us as we crept, covered in pine needles and melting snow, from the shadow under the bushes and into the dark safety of the neighbor's yard. We brushed ourselves off and walked down the street behind Kristy's house, laughing at our own appearances in the streetlight.

"What a waste of time," Emily sighed, when we'd calmed a little. "And we won't even be able to do this when school starts up. Anything we do will have to be after school, after homework, and before club meetings, family nights, and bedtime."

"What would it matter? We never accomplish anything more than a strange new look when we finally find ourselves a safe place to stand up," I pointed out, smoothing down some of my hair, which had gotten caught in a branch and was now sticking up on an angle. "And all we've ever found out about anyone is that they read books and watch TV at night, like almost everyone else."

* * *

**Author's Note: Looks like Emily and Claudia are getting a little depressed with the lack of action: not that I can blame them. I planned on having Kristy catch them, but I'm not very realistic in those situations, so I decided against it. Chapter nine (unless it happens to be chapter 8, and it may be since Claudia and Emily have nothing new to say yet (lol) should be from Bobbi's POV, so hopefully I'll be able to say a little more about the things I haven't said yet. I'm rambling; must go. Hungry…**

**EDIT: (January 4th 2010): I wrote this several days ago (perhaps even before the New Year; hope it's a good one for you!) and forgot to post it in the chaos. Yes, CHAOS. And I don't use that word often enough to describe my life, though I should. If I wrote an autobiography, that would have to be the title. In any case, we'll be moving again. If you know my family, you'd either be laughing or crying. Nine people (including two babies and an elder) and one small house, no money, and yet another move. Without exaggeration, we have done so (moved) about 100 times…So, to whom it seems like many who care for this story, I hope my updates won't be too erratic around (if this story isn't completed by then) the end of the month for you! Off to work on Chapter 8 now, since I have no excuse for slacking! :D**


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

I was sure I was hallucinating when I rounded the corner after my art class and found my attention drawn to someone in the crowd in front of the bank, waiting for the doors to open. It seemed to take stores and places dealing with money in general to take forever to open after the holidays, and it was why I was so cold. I'd just spent half an hour freezing outside of my favorite scrapbooking store, waiting for the place to open so I could replace the lace on a dress I was making for Sapphira, the doll (I was bored, since my painting assignment was done and I didn't have to waste three hours trying to write up a BSC notebook entry).

The girl wasn't quite recognizable. But she had the strangest green eyes I'd ever seen; beautiful and bright, almost inhuman. Her red-blonde hair (which I finally decided to call cinnamon-blonde) was thick, silky and shiny, and she was beautiful. Wearing a dark, forest-green tuque and matching cargo pants under her jacket, which hung open to reveal a matching tank top, she shivered in the lineup. I glanced at her dirty white sneakers, then at her face, before recognizing her. Even though it wasn't Bobbi, it could have been her (almost) identical twin sister. I looked more closely at the girl as I approached (slowly, since the line wasn't moving and there would be no rush, no need to slip on the ice) to make sure it wasn't Bobbi's invisible mother, dressed like a slobby teenager. But this girl was clearly not much more than sixteen, if she was that old at all.

_I can't wait until Emily hears about this,_ I thought, stopping to take a less obvious look at the girl as I pretended to look through my scrapbooking supplies. Just like Bobbi, she wore two silver rings in each ear, but had an industrial piercing, which I always secretly wanted, at the top of her left ear. She clearly shared Bobbi's beauty, but she looked like she'd never seen more than six dollars at a time. She looked a little ragged, like her clothes came from a second-hand store, and she wore an expression that reminded me of both Kerry and Bobbi Battista. I examined her more closely.

Like Bobbi, her eyes held a look of dark hatred, an almost defiant look of fear and pain. It was a haunting look, one that seemed strangely innocent, as though she was trying to hide something. I'd seen that same look once before, in a movie where a woman travelling through a small town devastated by a tornado spots a small family, a man, woman, and child, standing and holding each other in front of the wreckage that was presumably once a home. It was hard to describe her eyes, especially since she kept blinking as though she was trying not to cry, but I couldn't stop thinking about her eyes as I caught a bus (it was too cold to walk, but even on the bus I could see my own breath with every exhale) and what could cause torment like what she looked to be feeling. And most of all, I couldn't help but wonder if Bobbi's twin was the reason Kerry was so well-looked-after. There were a many possibilities, and my mystery-inclined curiosity couldn't help but try to think of them all. Any of them could be the truth, and if one of them was, maybe Bobbi didn't have to abuse Kerry for her to listen.

_Bobbi's twin could be hurting the child, and Bobbi tries to protect both of her sisters, by keeping Kerry safe from the twin and keeping the whole thing a secret to protect the twin. Or maybe Bobbi only abuses the older sister, which is why she looks so ragged, to provide for the younger sister. Or maybe Bobbi's lookalike was actually Kerry's mother and Bobbi's sister, or some other off family triangle like that._

And these were only a few of the possibilities. It was possible that this girl, who looked like Bobbi, was just a girl who looked like Bobbi. Just because they looked a lot alike (they could have been cousins, after all) didn't make them twins. It didn't even mean there was an evil twin situation at all. Maybe it just meant evolution had gotten somewhat lazy and made two people look identical.

"But they were practically identical," I insisted, spinning in my desk chair (grateful for cordless technology) and trying to convince Emily about how similar the girls looked. "Aside from eye color and a very minor difference in hair color, they could have been twins."

"Claudia, I believe you," Emily replied. "I do. The thing is, every possibility you mentioned makes sense, which means any of them could be true. I don't doubt Bobbi has help raising Kerry, but I'm still not sure she has a twin. If Bobbi's family was really as secretive as they've seemed to be, why wouldn't Bobbi just ask her sister to watch Kerry instead of asking an outsider to do it? The double-abuse thing kind of makes sense, too. If that were true, it'd be easy to see why Bobbi wouldn't want her sister watching Kerry. But think about this. Bobbi pays you a lot of money to watch Kerry, and she's obviously serious about graduating, which means unless she's a stress master and has a job, too, they have to be getting money from somewhere. And a lot of it. A ragged twin, a possible lawyer/banker mother only makes things _more_ confusing. The twin could have been visiting her banker mother today. Or maybe the Battista family is doing something illegal to make their money. Who knows? The thing is, we probably won't. Our attempts at spying have _not_ been things we'd write about if we ever actually became spies."

"I know. Definitely not the things to brag about. And because we know, or wish we knew, of covert Battista happenings only because of various illegal doings ourselves, exposing them even if we did find something out would only put us in as much trouble as they would be. If they're doing anything wrong at all."

Emily was silent for so long, I began to wonder if she was still on the line. I was about to ask when she began talking. "Yeah. And what's getting really annoying is, we've done more illegal things trying to prove how illegal _their_ life is than we've ever seen them do."

"Can you imagine if Kristy caught us?" I asked. "I keep thinking about that night, and even though it was two nights ago and we _weren't_ caught, I get the shivers just thinking about it. BSC members used to practically _kill_ themselves to make it to BSC meetings at five-thirty, and if someone was even half a second late, she'd give them a look so evil you'd swear she was going to grow devil horns and a sharp tail."

"If she caught us spying, we'd be dead," Emily agreed. "So it's safe to assume we won't be spying anytime soon to investigate the possible twin sighting?"

"We'd better not. You said it yourself that we've done more illegal things trying to prove Bobbi a criminal than we've seen her do, so I'm not sure the risk is worth it anymore. If nothing else, Kerry seems safe and you and I only have to deal with those sleepless nights, wondering about the possibilities and the reality. I don't feel bad, either, knowing we may not be on the lookout for anything else. I'm actually kind of relieved."

"I'm sure I'll spend plenty of nights awake, thinking about all of the possibilities. And how Bobbi keeps up a 'perfect life' façade, even though you and I ended up more suspicious than we should have. I guess we got a little carried away, huh?"

"Maybe. If nothing else, I'll go back to the Battista house and earn more money than a job for an angel should pay, and know nothing is wrong. I guess. But I think I'm going to keep my fingers crossed, anyway."

* * *

I spent the next several days baby-sitting for former BSC charges, painting, working on the doll dress, and wondering about the girl I'd seen at the bank, and whether or not Emily figured I was just imagining I saw Bobbi and was trying to put an end to our spying. The idea of a twin made sense to me, and the idea that it could be Bobbi or her 'imaginary' sister visiting their mother at work (it was possible, since Bobbi had said her mother was a lawyer, then slipped up (it seemed, anyway) and said she was a banker. When Bobbi called, I didn't think much of it until we hung up. Then I remembered, and it felt like a ton of cement bricks hitting me, that I would be going back to watch Kerry and pretend my illegal activities hadn't ever happened. I felt nervous anyway, knowing Bobbi could be calling to interrogate me or have me questioned and arrested by the police.

But like multiple other times, Bobbi left (in much less of a hurry than usual) and Kerry was waiting for me. As angelic as always in a simple yellow sundress, a matching headband pulling her hair out of her face (the black eye was gone) she reported that this was the day Bobbi graduated from high school, and even I, formerly Claudia 'C-' Kishi, could tell that Kerry's tone was full of admiration and pride. Strange, since most kids at three didn't understand school or the importance of graduation, if they understood any of it at all, but I figured Kerry and Bobbi were close enough to share an understanding of some kind, and although Kerry might not have understood everything, she probably knew enough to understand that graduation was a good thing.

We played several board games, had a bowl of ice-cream each, and Kerry took her bath, brushed her teeth, listened sleepily to the bedtime stories and fell asleep without any trouble. I heard no funny noises, wasn't disturbed by the guards (they all seemed to be in the exact same places they'd been in last time, so I wondered if something else had happened or if Bobbi simply just wasn't taking any chances) and went home wondering why, if Bobbi had a twin, the girl never came home to check on her sister, their house, or came home at all when I was there.

Reluctantly remembering Emily's eruptive outburst on the phone on Christmas day, just six days earlier (Kerry had told me about the New Year's party) I wondered if the twin girl was locked upstairs somewhere, perhaps watching us through some high-tech security system. It was possible.

_And I don't think thinking about the Battista family is ever going to amount to anything more than a uselessly distracted Claudia Kishi._

* * *

"Aww, she's so cute! Can I hold her?"

We weren't talking about Kerry Battista, for once. My little cousin, Lynn, who is almost a year old, was just learning how to walk and talk, and although some of her attempts were funny, a lot of them were adorable. Lynn has big, dark eyes; dark black hair, and skin kind of golden-brown, like mine, but lighter. Her favorite color seems to be yellow, and she was wearing yellow overalls over a flowery white tank top, with black rain boots and a bright white jacket. She toddled in and held out her arms to be picked up. I couldn't resist, but no sooner I had her in my arms then Janine came in, asking to hold her. In the past, it would have been close to impossible to pry Janine from her computer, and Janine had certainly never shown an interest in children. She used to shy away from them, and sometimes even acted like children were nuisances put on this planet specifically to annoy her. Now, with my life in practical ruins (my best friend dead, my other friends either always busy, sulking, or moved away, without even our club to hold us together somewhat) she was becoming more social. I wondered (well, Emily did, and when she told me what she was thinking, I was wondering, too) if my life had been so intimidating that only my life falling apart could bring Janine out into the world.

Despite my annoyance, I handed Lynn to Janine and greeted my aunt and uncle (nicknamed Russ, my uncle, and Peaches, my aunt) at the front door of our house. They visit as often now as they used to, so a visit with them was always nice.

About an hour through the visit, which was the day after my job with Kerry, which had been the same day as my sighting of Bobbi's lookalike, I heard my phone ringing in my bedroom. I wondered (something I seemed to be doing a lot of lately) if I'd missed any other calls. Our visit had been going so well that I'd forgotten to listen for the phone. So far, we'd had an early lunch (soup and sandwiches) and the rest of us, including Janine, played a long game of War (my favorite card game) while Mom did the dishes and Peaches washed Lynn's face, which was covered in sandwich crumbs.

"Hello?" I asked, figuring it was Emily asking, for at least the third time that morning, which chapter the review questions were at the end of that were due Friday, which was the next day, in History. (She has a memory like a sieve.) And before I forget, I should mention that my higher grades were mostly due to the fact that, for some unknown but wonderful reason, the local high school gave out as little homework as possible. Review questions at the end of a chapter weren't uncommon assignments, and worksheets, essays, and book reports were given out mostly only in the week or two before end-of-term exams. I'd finished mine already, since Thursday (this day) was a Pro-D day and I wanted it free for whatever happened. The visit with my aunt and uncle had been a good surprise, one worth doing my homework early for.

"Claudia, I'm glad I caught you," Bobbi's voice said, in a voice that indicated this wasn't her first call to my phone of the day. Maybe my phone had been ringing for a while, and I just hadn't heard it. "Do you think you'll be available to watch Kerry tonight? My mother is taking me out to supper to celebrate my graduation, and Kerry has a mild ear infection and wants you to have a rematch of Checkers."

I laughed, even though I felt a little bad that I'd been unreachable. Bobbi was calling on me more than I'd expected her to. "Sure, no problem. When should I be there?" I asked, inwardly wondering why Bobbi seemed to make a point to mention her mother almost periodically. Like she had a schedule for mentioning her mother, as if to make it seem like she had one. I hurried to stop myself from thinking that way.

"Can you be here by about five-thirty?" Bobbi asked. "We shouldn't be away more than two hours."

"No problem," I repeated. "I'll be there."

_Yes! Here's my opportunity to see whether or not Bobbi has a mother!_ All I had to do now was wait and see who came in and left with Bobbi later. This was great.

* * *

"I'm meeting her at the restaurant," Bobbi told me, when I asked why she was leaving the house alone. "She'd have picked me up, but she had to organize some case files for tomorrow's jury selection, so she'd have been late. They only hold reservations for people who show up on time," she added, hurrying for the silver Lexus. "Kerry should be fine; she just had her medication and might be drowsy."

I locked the door behind me as Bobbi drove away, disappointed. I'd been hoping to manage at least a glance at Mrs. Battista, or whatever she was called with her husband dead, and it didn't look like I'd have any other choice but to wait until Bobbi returned.

Kerry, for once, wasn't totally perfect. She accidentally spilled her milk when she was having supper (hot dogs) and tripped on her way into the living room, but she didn't cry either time. She even helped me mop up the milk with napkins. But we only managed three games of Checkers before Kerry fell asleep on the couch. I didn't want to risk waking her up (she looked exhausted) and put away the game board and pieces as quietly as I could. Kerry was still asleep an hour and a half later, when Bobbi returned. Alone.

"Didn't she show up?" I asked, referring to Bobbi's mother and hoping Bobbi wouldn't think I was being nosy by asking. Bobbi didn't seem offended.

"Yes, but she got a call halfway through and had to go back to the office," Bobbi said, in a tone that only slightly suggested it wasn't any of my business. "How was Kerry?"

"A little sleepy, and I didn't have the heart to move her," I replied, putting Bobbi's barely-condescending tone in the back of my mind. "She's good at Checkers."

Bobbi laughed, my curiosity forgotten. "Yes, she is. She even beats me sometimes, and I taught her!" She paid me and I left, trying not to feel rushed. But I couldn't help but feel a tinge of worry, knowing I'd have to be careful if I asked any other questions, and feeling like I was in the way made me feel a little annoyed and apologetic. It's hard to be upset with someone when you know they're right. Still, I could hardly wait to tell Emily that, despite Bobbi's having dinner with her, I still hadn't seen the Battista mother.

* * *

**Author's Note: Two chapters in one day! Yes! I hope this'll help make up for the possible upcoming delay between chapters. On a positive note, the next chapter will, at last and for the first time, be in Bobbi's POV! (Chapters with a three or six, like three, six, thirteen, and sixteen, etc. will be from a character POV other than Claudia's. These chapters will be marked and should center around Emily or Bobbi.) Thank you to everyone who has read, and especially to those of you who reviewed!**


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

**POV: Bobbi**

_**Journal Entry 143**_

**_January 7__th__, 2010_**

_I'm getting concerned about Kerry. The child psychologist we saw last year insisted that her behavior after our father's death was completely normal. He said that most children go through their own stages of grief, which may not be different than adult grief, but children tend to express things differently and sometimes feel that they can't or shouldn't. Another psychologist was more helpful. She said that children sometimes interpret death as abandonment. She said it can be because children fear that if they're bad, the parents will leave them. And some children, when a parent does leave, become incredibly polite and sweet to, hopefully, prevent anyone else from leaving. In a way, this completely makes sense. But our father died. Last year, in fact. The anniversary of that date is coming right up. Kerry couldn't have caused the accident any more than I could have prevented it, according to everyone who talks to us. But Kerry and I still have each other, and Mom, although she tends to work more than she said she would, is still home when she can be. She has a business trip coming up, and I have a strange feeling about our new baby-sitter. I'm pretty sure she's going to think the business trip is just another excuse for why she hasn't met our mother yet. Claudia Kishi seems nice, but she's a little strange. And I don't just mean her clothes. I know she has been on our property when nobody outside the family should have been. I know she's gone through our things. And I know she, or someone working with her, has poisoned several of our dogs. I even know that the sixth dog was poisoned by someone else. And still, I'm reluctant to fire her. For one thing, Kerry likes her. For another, Claudia is typically a great baby-sitter. She hasn't ever hurt Kerry or gotten upset with her, and unlike some of the sitters we've had in the past, this one cares enough to spend time with Kerry, reading books and playing games. And although she's been a little curious about us (which is really my fault, since I've never been a very trusting person) and gone through our things, she hasn't taken anything. And at this time, with more pressure than ever at Mom's law firm and people she prosecuted in the past now after us, I can't afford to trust anyone else. I know getting Claudia out of the picture permanently would make life a little safer for us, since she could be a spy, and if she isn't, being associated with us could still put her in danger, but trusting yet another person the way we trusted Emily (who didn't really do anything wrong, but started acting suspicious) isn't smart. Kerry just didn't like her much, and personally, I didn't, either._

"Bobbi? Are you still writing journal entries?"

My twin sister, Dahlia, stepped into the library as she spoke, knocking into a table and saving an authentic Ming vase from shattering on the wooden floor. She repositioned it on the table and took a seat in the chair across from me, without waiting for an answer. If there was ever to be a human dictionary, Dahlia's picture would be next to the word _clumsy_. Then again, her picture would probably be next to words like _distant_, _impatient_, and _reserved_, too. She doesn't talk often, and when she does, it's either very important or sarcastic. She doesn't think positively about much, and I guess it started more or less after our father died in the car accident. She and our mother have never been close, and she, unlike everyone else, thinks of Kerry as some pesky little nuisance. It could be because Kerry and our father were pretty close. Or it could have been because, the day our father died, Kerry was the only person our father had seen and told he loved to before he left for the airport. It was entirely coincidental that Dahlia had decided to go on a morning 'study' date and that I had a gymnastics class. It wasn't like our father purposefully told Kerry, and nobody else (our mother was at work when he left) that he told them he loved them before he died. But Dahlia never got over it, and for a long time, at least nine months, she was of no help. She refused to watch Kerry (hence the baby-sitters) and didn't care less if it meant I had to double my work load. It wasn't enough that I was in advanced classes or graduating early; I also had to parent a child almost entirely alone. Sometimes, these situations bring people together. My family seemed to only fall apart further. It wasn't Dahlia's fault, of course. Not entirely. But like most people, I deal with situations a little better if some of the blame is shouldered off onto someone else. Dahlia was a perfect target.

"I have a date tonight," Dahlia began, "with the most amazing guy. I just met him this morning at the mall. He's _so_ cute…"

You can probably tell by now that if Dahlia was in a dictionary, several other words could be used to describe her. _Ditzy_ might be one, and _superficial_ was another. _Boy_-_obsessed_ with capital letters. The thing is, she usually dresses like a slob. Only when she was younger did anyone ever see her without a tuque, and now, she's rarely without an endless supply of cargo pants, tank tops, sweatshirts, and sneakers. Nothing is wrong with those things, but her reason for wearing them is that she thinks they make her look sultry and sexy. And maybe, to guys who like stringy blonde hair that hasn't been washed or brushed in days, she is. How any of them would even want to run their fingers through that hair during a kiss (which is something I know she likes) is beyond me. I know a lot of modern people think the Gaia Moore look (the main character in Francine Pascal's book series, _Fearless_) attractive. And maybe it is, somewhat. I guess it might represent being wild or natural to prefer baggy clothes you can move easily in, and a generally low-maintenance look. Unfortunately, Dahlia's low-maintenance look came with a low-maintenance attitude.

The psychologist we saw for the first few weeks after our father's death suggested we keep a notebook handy, like a journal, so when we needed to vent, we could do so without hurting anyone. It made great sense to me, and I've filled many pages. Dahlia thinks its lame that I like (and graduated) school, thinks its lame that I considered (and plan to go to) college, and is probably annoyed that she was even asked to watch her little sister when Mom took me out to celebrate my graduation. (Dahlia refused to come, probably because it might have made her feel hypocritical. Dropping out of school probably wasn't the smartest move she'd made.)

"Yes, I'm still writing," I replied, simultaneously trying to change the subject, ignore the fact that Dahlia had yet another date (she has many, or at least, many excuses—it wouldn't surprise me if she's used fake 'dates' to get out of watching Kerry) and write at the same time. I like to record as much as I can about my life, when I have time. Graduating high school had given me time. I like to write about the dreams I have at night, what goes on during the day, and whatever my hopes and goals for the future are. At first I wrote mostly about how much I missed my father, and how different life without him was. Some of the entries were angry, since I felt like he'd left us to teach us a lesson. But now, writing was a good way to vent and record my life. Dahlia kept talking, about her date, I assume (I don't know, as I usually tune her out) and I examined my journal, which had been a birthday gift from my mother several months earlier. (I had already written almost one hundred and fifty entries into it, and I hadn't even filled half the book! Then again, with Dahlia's pointless interruptions, that made sense.) The book was really beautiful, in my opinion. It was a dark, forest green, with fancy gold designs on the front, back, and outer spine. The pages inside were white, with black lines in the central area of each page and dark green, leafy vines bordering the corners of each. I was doing my best to write neatly, and the smooth pages and superior ink of an expensive gold pen (which matched the journal and lock) made it easy. Dahlia would never understand any of that, though, and I never bothered to explain.

"…and he said his name was Logan—cute, right?—and we're going to dinner at Antonio's, that little Italian place, and then to the beach!" Dahlia continued.

"The beach? You _do_ know its January, don't you?" I asked, wondering if Dahlia's careful hours of straightening her usually wavy hair had somehow poisoned her brain.

"Yes. Who cares? It'll still be romantic. The water won't be frozen, and this is the night of the full moon!"

"Yes, and another twelve inches of snow have been predicted," I shot back, knowing perfectly that WSTO, the local radio station, was probably wrong. We'd only been living in Stoneybrook for a month and a half, and already, I knew the weather forecasters here weren't any smarter than they had been back home.

"Like that'll happen. You're probably just jealous you can't get a boy to like you!" Dahlia stood to leave in a huff, like the world revolved around boys, and made sure that the tank top (which she has a matching, equally-tight miniskirt to go with but wasn't wearing) revealed the only friends she probably has as she stood up. (I don't know whether she likes the 'wild and beautiful' look, or the 'slutty cheerleader' look. With Dahlia, it's almost impossible to know which fad she's into at the moment.)

I decided against a cool, sarcastic remark (too Dahlia) and ignored her. I had more important things to worry about than whether or not Dahlia and her circle of snobby friends (the only thing she likes more than herself is other people just like her) thought I was cool. In fact, that was the _last_ thing I cared about. For one thing, I hate anniversaries, and I hated the fact that Mom wanted to take the three of us on a trip back home to visit the grave. I also hated that we'd have to stay with Mom's sister, who I'll never refer to as an aunt because she acts more like…well, I'm not even sure there are words to describe her. She's very religious and isn't very tolerant of anyone who isn't or anyone she deems to be doing something wrong. She can argue with anyone over anything, and is so old-fashioned that her views on modern issues are laughable. She also hates me, hates that Mom's husband died, hates remarriage, thinks I'm doing terribly at watching Kerry, and thinks Dahlia, aside from her ratty look, is the best. That alone says plenty. She's nothing like Mom. Even so, I think Mom and her sister love each other somewhat. They're as different as Dahlia and I are, and I can't imagine many sisterly relationships in our family working out in any other way. Dahlia and Kerry are a good example.

Kerry and I are pretty close, for which I'm glad. Even if she and I were cousins, I think we'd get along. (However, since my only relatives include my mother's sister and my dead father, that would make her my mother's sister's daughter…okay, this is getting confusing. It would make her my hated aunt's daughter.) If Kerry had been raised by my aunt, she'd be pretty different.

As Dahlia left the library and I locked my journal shut, planning on finishing the entry later that night (I could stay up late if I wanted, since even if I did go to college, I'd wait until September when the new semester started) Kerry wandered in, spotted me, and ran over. She rarely ever runs, but even Kerry knows not to spend too much time with Dahlia. Ever since the two of them spent an hour together (almost six months ago) Kerry refuses to be alone in a room with her. I wonder about it sometimes, but Kerry just tells me Dahlia gives her nasty looks when I ask. And I asked Dahlia a few times, but she never said anything more than 'Leave me alone,' which I did.

"Hey," I greeted Kerry, helping her into my lap. She glanced at my journal (she knows its importance to me) and didn't ask any questions. She leaned against me sleepily and waited for the inevitable part of our evening routines: Dahlia would scamper off to a date, Mom would call to say she'd be late and ask me to start supper or order out, and Kerry would spend the whole evening, while I cooked or called for pizza, with me. We'd eat together, I'd go through her nightly rituals after games, and she'd fall asleep and I'd usually then finish my homework assignments, but I didn't have to worry about those anymore. True to tradition, Dahlia was leaving when Kerry and I reached the kitchen, the phone was ringing (and Dahlia hadn't bothered to answer it) and on cue, I felt my stomach growl with hunger.

After Mom's ritualistic call, I made one myself to Pizza Express and played four games of Checkers and two rounds of hide-and-seek before the pizza arrived. Kerry and I ate, and she cleaned up the games while I put the leftover pizza away, and after Kerry's bath, she fell asleep without even asking for a story. I turned off the light and crept out, even though she usually remains sleeping once she's out.

It was weird to have time to myself. Before I'd graduated, sixty percent of my time was taken up with trying to study and keep Kerry entertained at the same time. Dahlia was of no help, and our mother was too busy to notice that I'd gotten Claudia to watch Kerry multiple times or that Dahlia hadn't gotten a job or helped out at all since dropping out of school (which, if anything, is probably the last thing Mom actually remembers about us.) Now, though, with Kerry asleep (the medication for her ear infection had even gotten her back into taking afternoon naps!) I had time to read, listen to music, and update my journal, which was nice.

_Maybe this is how Dahlia felt when she first dropped out,_ I thought, as I prepared a cherry cheesecake. (Mom refused to hire butlers and maids, and personally, I'm pleased that she never hired a chef, since I love cooking, and it's a good thing I do since I'm the only one who does any.) I have a shelf devoted entirely to recipe books in my room. This recipe was my father's favorite, and I knew it by heart. _The freedom for the first few weeks must have been indescribable._

"You'll never be like me," Dahlia had said more than once.

My silent response to that was always, '_Good, I'd rather not be_.' Maybe it was rude, but I had better things to do than waste time with dating. Like looking after Kerry, for instance. Unlike Dahlia, I could cook and clean. Someone had to. I couldn't just sit around all day, like she did.

Despite my front (which means the same as _façade_) I was jealous. Jealous that Dahlia could go out on dates, could go shopping without feeling guilty. As much as I loved Kerry, and as much as I knew she depended on me and my sacrifices, I wished on more than one occasion, usually when Dahlia was out and I was putting Kerry to bed when I should have been studying or out with friends, that I could be out with people my age. It wasn't right for me be the only adult in our situation. So Mom brought home the bread.

Great. But she was never there to put it away, or to cook up a traditional meat and potatoes meal, or put her own baby to bed, or to sing a song or tell a story. She hadn't always been this way. She used to drive Dahlia and I (and our friends) to soccer (or hockey, or basketball, or gymnastics) practice and bake cookies and even drive a minivan. She was the stereotypical 'perfect mom,' someone who could cook and clean and be the one person everyone could confide in. Now, _I_ was trying to be the perfect mom, and I was only, barely, seventeen. I should have been in school, complaining about homework, pop quizzes, boys and zits. I should have been at the mall, getting into trouble and shopping and talking about clothes and boys and zits. (The topics of teenage conversation never seemed, to me anyway, to change from one day to the next.) Even so, despite feeling too much older, or more mature, whatever, I missed that life. The life I'd had as a kid, before my father died. Before the move. Before those things, I'd been a bit like Dahlia. I spent most of my time hanging out with friends, shopping at the mall, studying, going to gymnastics practice, and generally having fun. My mother was home when I came home, ready to talk while we cleaned and listened to music. She and I had a system for the stereo; she'd listen to three songs of her choice, and then I'd listen to three of mine. Sometimes, Dahlia joined us. Kerry would dance to whatever we were listening to, laughing over our arguments about Mom's music choices versus songs picked by Dahlia and I. We never fought seriously. We spent a lot of time laughing. The best times were when Dad was home and would crack jokes and pretend to sing. We'd had a family portrait taken and sometimes we joked that our father was the prettiest. He'd always laugh (he laughed a lot, which made him almost immediately likeable by everyone) and give us outrageous beauty tips. And he had a great laugh, just as deep as his voice. Something about the laugh always made me feel safe. Not because he was a man, but because he was my father and I never doubted that he loved me. Loved us, I should say. But Dahlia was mad at the world and couldn't care about anything, and Mom was too busy now. Despite my longing for my father and my old life, where my parents both loved spending time with us and Dahlia and I were almost as close as Kerry and I are now, I knew it wasn't going to happen. Mom's ways of dealing with the loss was to work like a demon and avoid all mention of the fact that our lives weren't as good as they once were. I didn't know what to do about Dahlia, and anything helpful I tried with her would be rejected as lame, pointless, and unnecessary, because apparently she was 'just fine.' And no matter how much I wanted a social life, with people my age, I couldn't, I _wouldn't_, abandon Kerry. She needed me.

It was nice that _someone_ needed me. Aside from Kerry, Claudia Kishi, our weird baby-sitter, was all I really had. And that was, as Dahlia would say, 'really lame.'

* * *

**Author's Note: Well, here it is! I hope it lives up to expectations! Personally, I don't know what to make of this one. I think I've come to depend on review feedback too much…but in any case, let me know what you think, okay? This is, so far, my most successful story, and I like it! (Really! And I usually hate my work!) So, anyway, this is basically a chapter a little about Bobbi. She still has some secrets even I'm not sure of yet, so there may be (I hope) more chapters from her perspective. Let me know what you think, please! Every review I've gotten is much appreciated! :D**

**(The '2010' part of Bobbi's journal entry doesn't coincide with dates the actual BSC books were written. I just have to write things this way, since the actual members of the original series were thirteen for about thirteen years. And dates mentioned in the fic/dates I updates were usually the same days I wrote the story. If I remember right, the chapter with Christmas in it was actually written on Christmas Day (2009) and this chapter, for Jan. 7th, was written on the sixth! And this, with nine chapters now, has about 34,490 words, making it my most successful story ever! Oh, and if these Author Note things are bugging anyone, let me know...I tend to feel like I have to make excuses for the chapter...) lol :P**


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

I used to look forward to weekends. When the BSC was still alive, weekends meant we could plan something with the children we cared for, and have as many poolside chatfests and sleepover pizza parties as we wanted, as well as trips to the mall.

Now, weekends meant more time that I spent alone, usually sitting on the porch swing (if it was warm enough, and it hadn't been lately) or in my room. Bobbi wouldn't be calling on me as often now that she was out of high school, and Emily had busied herself with a project for the school newspaper, something about creating a poetry section for the students who could write and needed a place to show it off. That was cool, since I'd once dated a poetic guy (in the same year that I was thirteen) and had found that, as bad as I was at writing it, I liked reading poetry. This was one of the things that, if ever someone wrote a book about me, wouldn't be mentioned because nobody, not even my BSC friends, had figured it out. (I'm sure someone would have teased me about it if they had.) I was kind of considering entering one of my poetic attempts in the poetry paper.

I was in my room, trying to figure out how to write a poem about confusion and how hard it is to be strong (something I think I know quite a lot about) when I finally sat back against my pillows, wishing one of my friends was with me to help me. Mary Anne could have come up with several ways to brainstorm ideas and words, and any of them would have had a blast trying to rhyme the words and figure out which other words would sound/fit better and rhyme.

But there was no one I could turn to. I was one of the last real BSC members, and I doubted I'd ever see or hear from any of them again.

_I'll bet writing down several examples of what I consider tough things to live through would help_, I decided, and picked up my notebook and pen again. _And what better examples to use than my own? If half of the research I did at the library last year meant anything, even if a lot of it was done for other reasons, I know a lot of famous poets used their own experiences to write the poetry that became famous_.

If I remembered right, and mostly, my interest in poetry came shortly after Stacey's death when I was miserable and hoping desperately for a relief from the grief. I'd gone to the library, found a mystery (a thick book called _Entombed_) and liked it. Maybe reading a mystery like that wasn't the best thing for a grieving mind, but it had worked. It had started me into wanting to read Edgar Allen Poe's work, then the story of his life. I was fascinated. Janine, Miss Dictionary of Stoneybrook, had given me more than enough detail about both. For once, at least, all of her many years of studying had a use.

(She hadn't even bothered to bug me about my newfound interest in something else she probably thought worthwhile. Maybe she hadn't understood why I asked. It was unlikely she was ignoring me to be nice, but was probably sure I needed the information for a school assignment I was too lazy to research myself. In any case, I'd been happy.)

I glanced down at the empty pages and began to write down, in no particular order, some of the most traumatic events I could remember about my life.

_Mimi's death. Stacey's death. Being accused of cheating on a test. The disintegration of the BSC. The various fights between friends. The day Stacey told me she was leaving the club. The day I thought I was being hunted down by the Phantom Phone Caller. The day I thought I was adopted. The day Mary Anne found out her father sent her to live with her grandparents in Iowa when she was little. The night Mary Anne's house burned down. The day Kristy's dog died. The day Kristy moved across town; the day she told us the BSC was no longer together because of a fight. The day Dawn moved back to California. The day Stacey ended up in the hospital because of her diabetes. The time Kristy's father returned for her and kept missing important things in her regular life. The weeks when Mallory had mononucleosis and couldn't be part of the club for a while, which left us all busy and tired…Oh, and, of course, being stranded on an island._

It was hard to think only of myself. My thoughts kept wandering to the bad things that happened in the lives of my friends. We'd been so close, so connected, their lives and families seemed like mine. We were like one soul in multiple bodies. Our homes were each other's homes. There were almost never any secrets between us.

As hard as it was to keep my mind on my own past, it was just as hard to forget the good things that happened between the ten of us.

_The time we won the lottery and went to California. The time Jessi had a small role in a movie. The times my artwork was exhibited in a gallery. Making up after fights. Meeting new BSC clients. Wearing a sandwich board to school, advertising the BSC because a rival agency threatened to ruin us. (Bad time, but it turned out well. Just like when I was accused of cheating. I proved my innocence and did even better on the second test than I had on the first.) Trips to New York, other states, across the country, and even into other countries. Being rescued from the island. Being given Mimi's doll. Knowing Stacey's killer was going to be behind bars forever. Time spent with family, friends, and BSC charges. Participating in Kristy's wild and weird advertising, money-making, fund-raising, and fun BSC-related schemes. Pranking Cokie Mason on Halloween night._

I sighed a little. There was too much depth to these situations to get them right. Baby-sitting wasn't always fun, and most of these situations, while traumatic and exciting, were good _and_ bad. I'd once broken my leg while looking after an eight-year-old, who was partly to blame for my accident. Looking after the Nicholls boys wasn't fun. In fact, that one was probably best described as awful and horrifying. And the situation with Kerry and the Battista family in general was one of the most mixed situations.

So, with a page full of my messy handwriting, I tossed the notebook beside me and sighed. There was no way I could make a book of poetry out of my memories. There were too many, and too much detail and emotion to account for. One sitting job with Jackie Rodowski was about as exciting and traumatic as I could handle. Painting these things would probably be easier, but how can you express anger and frustration in rainbow colors? I'd been told before I was a good artist. Maybe that creativity just wouldn't stretch to poetry. Or writing in general. It wouldn't surprise me if I never wrote a poem. When I was six, I still couldn't spell my name. At the bottom of an assignment I'd completely misunderstood (to draw a portrait of myself) I'd written "CALUDIA" and drawn a butterfly. I'd thought I was supposed to draw myself as I saw myself, and Mimi told my teacher I thought of myself as a 'free spirit,' like a butterfly. The other kids had all drawn pictures of faces framed by hair, with two eyes, a nose, and mouth. And they'd remembered their names, and spelled them right. I'd felt stupid until Mimi's intervention.

I briefly considered writing a short story (very Mallory) about how I was fourteen but felt much older when I decided I was going crazy. I was not a writer, nor a poet. Maybe I needed some fresh air.

I shrugged into my jacket, found my boots, and hurried down the street. I'd gone to the bank the day before (Stacey would have been proud) and opened a savings account. With all the money I'd earned watching Kerry, it added up to almost two hundred and fifty dollars. I'd decided against buying new art supplies and clothes, remembering a self-defense class I'd taken a few months earlier. I'd learned multiple moves for defending myself if ever I was attacked, and practiced a few times a week. But what I remembered most was the stories I heard in those classes. Several men attended, but the stories of the woman who had to escape an abusive husband (which reminded me of the Nicholls) were the most memorable.

That was why I'd decided to start up a savings account. I usually got between ten and twenty regular sitting jobs per month, which meant I made between fifty to a hundred dollars a month. That didn't even include jobs for families that paid extra, like the Battista family did, since there weren't many. But because there was 'danger' involved in the job, the pay was higher. And if I saved half of my monthly earnings, I had enough to buy art supplies, clothes, junk food, books, and whatever else I needed and continue to expand my account, which I liked. I felt safer with money nobody else could touch hidden. Even my parents didn't know about the account, which was especially nice.

I could just imagine them finding out. If the bank called about it and my parents hadn't bothered to listen to me, they'd wonder how I'd gotten so much money. And they'd wonder why I hadn't told them sooner, and they'd probably wonder then if I'd stolen it.

Because Stacey had always (since we met, anyway) had her own savings account, I knew a little about how it all worked. And although I wanted to put twenty dollars into it today, since I'd been on four jobs since my last with Kerry, I also had to stop off at the mall to check out a sale on shoes. (I hadn't promised not to spend half of whatever I made in a month, so I decided not to feel guilty about it and at least check it out.) Besides, Janine was being bothersome again, quoting famous poets (probably to make me admit that I liked poetry) and spouting random historical facts, and I didn't want to hear anything more on the subject of the Civil War.

"Claudia!"

I didn't recognize the voice, and kept walking. I figured there was another Claudia in the mall. But just as I reached Penny's, I felt a tap on my shoulder and whirled around to face whoever had managed to sneak up on me. And it was impressive that she had, since she was wearing high heels. It took a moment for me to recognize her.

"Ashley?"

The girl nodded, with a big smile. "Long time no see."

_No kidding._ One of the last times I'd seen Ashley Wyeth, she'd pulled me from my friends (and I didn't resist, since she and I had a lot in common, mainly our interest in art) and we got into a fight because I wouldn't give up the club for her, and she dedicated most of her time to art. I had no idea where she'd gone after that, but I couldn't recall ever seeing her again.

"So, what have you been up to?"

"Baby-sitting," I replied, mostly because (aside from the fact that it was the truth) I knew it would annoy her.

Her face didn't show any signs of disgust. "Ahh."

I bent down to examine a set of gorgeous pearl earrings, and when I stood up next, Ashley was still beside me. Obviously, she wanted something.

"Listen, Claudia, I need your help," Ashley began. She shifted uncomfortably and scanned the jewelry in the display case just inside the store. "I know the Baby-Sitters Club broke up, and I wanted to ask you if you could help me with a problem, since I heard you've still been baby-sitting."

"Okay…" I replied slowly, confused. This situation, had it been mentioned on the back of a mystery book, it probably would have said something like _'An old acquaintance returns with no mention of her mysterious past or disappearance, asking for help.'_

"Well, the thing is, I'd like you to tutor me on painting. I saw that fruit basket you painted, and I loved it. The crystal basket especially. And I wanted to apologize about everything I said last year. None of what I said was right, no matter how much art meant to me. It wasn't right for me to say you'd never be an artist if you didn't quit your club. And I need some baby-sitting tips. My sister just had a baby, and I need to know as much as I can." She looked embarrassed.

"Oh…thanks," I said, unsure. "I'd like to help you—"

"Too busy?" Ashley was backing away, like I was a bomb about to explode. "I'll bet your friends wouldn't like it that you and I were spending time together again, anyway."

"No, it's not that," I interrupted. "I thought you said you knew what happened to the BSC. I don't really have friends anymore. Not those friends, anyway. I just think it's weird that you appear out of nowhere and ask for help, when you've always been such a good artist."

Ashley laughed, sounding a little nervous. What was with her? "Oh, that. Well, to be honest, I never thought I was very good. I know I studied at Keyes, but you always had a special talent. And you've always been the only person in Stoneybrook who knew as much as you did about children." She said the word children as though it left a horrible taste in her mouth. "And about the apology, I didn't feel right leaving things as they were. I know we kind of made up before, but things were still too tense." She smoothed down her long, flowery white skirt and smiled at me, looking a little nervous.

"ASHLEY!" A masculine yell from across the mall caused her to flinch, and she quickly scribbled something onto a small piece of paper. "GET OVER HERE!"

"Call me, okay?" she whispered, slipping the piece of paper into my hand and hurrying away, disappearing into the crowd.

* * *

I finished my shopping, did my banking, and hurried home. The situation with Ashley—the apology, the requests, the phone number, and most of all, the nervous way she was—had given me the creeps. I couldn't help but imagine that if Kerry was old enough to express herself (and if she had to) that Ashley was acting a lot like someone who was used to abuse. But I quelled my thoughts and forced myself to get through an afternoon with Janine, who for some reason was craving human contact and stuck around to help while I made a cake and then did the dishes, talking all the while so I wouldn't be able to escape. She even helped me make supper later, after she managed to con me into playing Trivial Pursuit (the computer edition) for an hour. For someone who doesn't like human contact, she sure knows how to get people to do what she wants them to do.

"Janine, can I ask you some questions?" I asked, when she and I were setting the table. She nodded, probably speechless because I was talking to her.

"Well…" I didn't really know how to bring up a subject with her. The truth was, I wanted to talk about Kerry and Ashley, but I felt pretty silly about talking to Janine, especially about these things. Stacey used to be one of the only people I could talk to if there was, or if I thought there was, a problem. And the fact was, I was feeling exhausted. There wasn't much left to talk about on the subject of Kerry, and only time would tell whether or not Ashley had been nervous about talking to me for the first time since our fight or whether I should really be concerned for her about something else. And I was starting to feel a little concerned about me. I'd been focusing so much energy on Kerry and her situation that I felt a little left out of my own life, which was a very odd feeling.

"Never mind," I finally said, and Janine shrugged, as though by not talking to her I was missing out on something. She headed upstairs to her room (where she spends about ninety-five percent of her life, when she's not at school or the library) and I sat down at the kitchen table and waited for Mom and Dad to come home with whatever they'd decided supper was. Usually, they just brought home a pizza on Saturday nights.

I was bored. Painting had grown dull (and I couldn't help but wonder why Ashley Wyeth would want my help, especially when she was already great) and I was a little lonely. In the past, Stacey would have suggested I go out and get a boyfriend.

Maybe that wasn't such a bad idea.

_Are you kidding?_

_Why not_? I countered, arguing with myself. _Baby-sitting only takes up a few hours a week, I'm caught up with my classes, and there's nothing I can do about Kerry unless I actually saw, and could prove, that Bobbi hit her. And anyway, having a boyfriend wouldn't be such a bad thing. At least it would get you out of the house and away from Janine and thoughts about death, which come all too easily at this time of year._

But I was hesitant to find a boyfriend. For one thing, getting a boyfriend wasn't like making friends in kindergarten. You couldn't just walk up to someone and ask for friendship or a relationship at the age of fourteen. For another, I'd had 'boyfriends' in the past and they, like pets (ha!) needed attention, something I couldn't give if Bobbi decided she needed me again.

_This isn't about Bobbi. This is your life, Claudia Kishi, and it does note revolve solely around another family. Bobbi can find another sitter for days when I'm unavailable._

And yet, I'd feel stupid and irresponsible if Bobbi had to trust someone else, especially if that 'someone else' didn't work out and Kerry was kidnapped. I guessed Kristy's strict, responsible attitude had finally rubbed off on me.

I decided to go out and hope to meet up with Jason Ceralle, my current crush, and if that didn't work, there was always my endless stream of baby-sitting jobs to look forward to.

* * *

**Author's Note: Claudia gets sarcastic when bored…and don't worry, Claudia isn't just going to sit around for the next ten or twenty chapters. I do plan for something new, and interesting to happen soon, in the next Claudia chapter, Eleven (as I can't write another where she's just sitting around at home, brooding) and I'm looking forward to it. Hope you are, too! (Even though the last few chapters have been boring.) Anyway, whether you're bored or not yet, please review!**

**Oh, and for anyone curious, '_Entombed_' is a real book (and part of a series) by Linda Fairstein, and I think the older Claudia would like them. :)**


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

_There she is again!_

The girl walking alone down the frozen main street of town was definitely none other than Bobbi's lookalike. The snow had melted in the last three weeks, and it had been raining steadily since. But this morning was a pleasant, dry day, and although cloudy and cold, the perfect day for shopping. In fact, the day was just perfect—I'd managed to snag a date with Jason Ceralle, and although I had to spend almost forty dollars on a new dress (since I hadn't gotten any new clothes in a while) I was happy. It was one of those tight dresses, sleek and silky, and black. The kind a much more mature girl could be expected to wear to a cocktail party. In any case, I knew it would be perfect, especially with my new black heels, because Jason Ceralle was rather wealthy and I knew I'd have to look good on a date with him. Although the last time I'd seen her had been weeks ago, I could still clearly remember the long, black wool coat she wore over her dark green, baggy cargo pants and tank top. I could still remember her faded sneakers and her tuque, pulled tight over her beautiful, stringy hair. Her clothes still seemed old—though she wore the same coat, she now wore faded jeans with a hole in the right knee and a tattered tank top, and her sneakers looked to be in even worse condition than they had been before. Duct tape seemed to be all that held them together.

She disappeared from sight as she rounded a corner, heading into a dark alley sandwiched between two buildings.

I had to hurry to catch the bus, but as it turned out, it wouldn't matter. The bus still hadn't arrived five minutes after ten A.M., and I checked my watch again and shifted impatiently from one foot to the other. I was supposed to meet Jason at the Rosebud Café, and if the bus was late, I would be, too. I knew I should have gone dress-shopping sooner, but Jason hadn't called to make a date until the previous night, and I'd called Ashley four times since she ambushed me at the mall, and she'd been taking up quite a lot of my phone time. She didn't seem to have much to say, but just talking about the gossip and events of school took up time. And time was one thing I didn't have much of today.

When the bus finally came (thirteen minutes late) I boarded and found a seat at the back. I let my thoughts wander briefly to the mysterious twin of Bobbi and wondered if it could be Bobbi in disguise—plenty of wealthy people with enemies used disguises—and rejected the idea. Not only could I not prove anything, but I wasn't willing to risk trying. Beside, I had exactly one hour and forty-seven minute to get ready for my date and get down to the café before Jason did and saw me getting off the bus or out of my father's car. I didn't want him to see either, and I didn't want him to see me wearing what I was wearing now—jeans, a sweater, and sneakers. I felt pretty ugly that morning.

Just as I rushed into the house, with only an hour and forty minutes left to get ready and get to the café, I knew I was going to have some trouble being on time. For one thing, I was home alone and the phone was ringing. Probably a telemarketer, and I hate being rude to them. For another, the message light was blinking on the answering machine, and a note from Mom was stuck to the fridge with a magnet in the shape of a rainbow butterfly.

The caller was for a Chelsea Farrell, and obviously a wrong number. When I'd listened to and saved the message on the machine, I rushed upstairs, took a quick shower, remembered I'd forgotten to check Mom's note, and hurried back downstairs. _Gone grocery shopping. Back by three. Love, Mom._ I ran back upstairs, did my makeup, cut the tags from my dress, and blow-dried and brushed my hair into a ponytail. I hadn't cut my hair in two years, and it now fell to just above my waist. I'd styled my own bangs so that they were sideswept and looked slightly windblown, and my black and silver tiger-striped scrunchie looked great with my dress. I slid my feet into my shiny black heels, brushed my teeth, and changed my earrings. Instead of the big, silver hoops I'd decided on that morning, I now put my delicate gold hoops (with a shiny pearl at the bottom of each) into my three pierced holes. They were my special earrings, ones I wore only when I had an important reason to wear them. They'd been a gift from Mimi, and I'd worn them to her funeral, to Stacey's funeral, and to several other funerals, weddings, parties, and even to several babysitting jobs with Kerry, just because I didn't feel right being in such a nice mansion and not looking somewhat like I belonged there. Like on a date with Jason, being a slob in the Battista house wasn't a bright idea. At least, it always made me feel out of place. I was surprised I managed to get through that much date prep without being interrupted, but just as I'd begun to feel pleased, I took out my makeup and the phone rang. This time, though, I had only fifteen minutes to do my makeup before I had to leave, since getting to the Rosebud Café, especially since my parents weren't home to drive me and the buses were running late (or they had been, anyway) took another ten to twenty minutes on a good day.

"Hello?" I asked, hoping with my fingers crossed that it wasn't Ashley Wyeth. It wasn't, and I was relieved when a different voice replied. But the relief was momentary, as the other voice I hadn't been counting on hearing (and, to be honest, hoping not to hear from) was Bobbi's.

"Claudia? We have a problem," Bobbi replied, without greeting me as most people do. "I'm afraid I'm going to need you tonight, if you can make it." Her voice was oddly strained, and I could hear multiple emotions conflicting in it. Panic, anger fear—and more than anything, something that sounded far too much like suspicion for my liking. Inwardly, I'd been thinking, _please, don't make me cancel my first date with Jason!_ But, hearing her voice, I was curious and agreed to come over. She gave me the details, sounding a little short, and hung up. I rushed to do my makeup, caught the bus (at least it was on time) and made it to the café at exactly two minutes before twelve. Jason wasn't there yet, and I seated myself at one of the big, leather booths in a corner at the back. The windows to my left faced the beach, framed by forest and mountains, and I was glad for the peaceful scenery. My insides were twisting, like the time I'd had a cup of sour milk (I'd had a cold and couldn't tell, but my stomach certainly could) and I doubted it was because I was nervous about seeing Jason. For some reason, I had a really bad feeling about the situation with Bobbi and Kerry. _If something was really wrong, though,_ I tried to rationalize, _she would have asked me to come over right away, not later on…_

And yet, even as Jason arrived and looked absolutely gorgeous (he's one of those tall, muscular guys with deep, dark eyes, great skin and a wonderful voice) in a suit and tie, I couldn't help but wonder why Bobbi had called.

* * *

Despite the fact that my date had gone perfectly (and he'd even asked me to the upcoming Valentine's Day dance at school, the Heart Hop—don't ask _me_ who names those things!) and I really liked Jason, I couldn't help but cross my fingers as I walked towards the Battista front gate from the bus stop. It was as if, no matter what was happening in my life, everything revolved around this place, the Battista mansion and the strange things I couldn't help but be suspicious of. I'd tried to put the whole situation and its existence out of my mind, but it wasn't easy. With tests coming up and my painting class, and Bobbi not calling me as often since she graduated, it had almost been a reality, a blissful place of oblivion where I wasn't Claudia the Hero (heroine?) but just Claudia, a student with now-average grades, baby-sitting jobs more frequent than most teenaged girls ever got, and art classes to attend once a week.

I rang the doorbell and waited, surveying the yard. I'd never seen the yard without a foot of snow, and I had to admit that, even at the frozen end of January, it looked nice. The Christmas decorations were gone, and aside from the lack of snow that covered the grass and stone pathway to the front door, everything looked pretty much the same. It wasn't a long wait. Bobbi answered the door.

If I'd been expecting this to be a normal job, I was wrong. I could hear Kerry crying in the kitchen, and just as I stepped inside, I saw Bobbi's lookalike bound down the stairs, glance at me in a way that indicated she was uninterested in my presence, and hurried to the kitchen. I shot Bobbi a look of confusion that she didn't pay attention to, instead vaguely pushing the door shut and leading the way into the kitchen as the door closed, barely, behind me. Now nervous, I followed her.

A woman who I assumed was Mrs. Battista was holding Kerry, who was still crying. The remains of supper, dishes and all, were still on the table. The kitchen was a mess, and I doubted it had been cleaned all day, if at all in the past week.

"We should be home by nine," the woman said, handing Kerry, now just sniffling, to me. Bobbi and the other girl followed the woman, at a run, out to the car. I heard the door lock behind them, and Kerry buried her face in my neck. I'd only been there a moment, and already, I felt overwhelmed.

I did what I thought was best: I sat Kerry down on the couch and rubbed her back until she calmed down, which didn't take long. When she had managed a smile (I had to throw a ball around and hit myself in the face with it a few times before she did) I tickled her. When she'd settled down at the kitchen table with a glass of Coke, a stack of paper, and a new box of crayons, I tackled the mess in the kitchen. I was curious about the emergency, but I doubted asking Kerry was a good idea. If she understood it, talking about it could upset her, and I didn't want to do that. And anyway, I had the feeling I'd know what was happening when Bobbi returned.

I cleared the table, loaded the dishwasher, and wiped the kitchen down with a wet washcloth before putting the food into the fridge for the Battista family to deal with when they returned. I joined Kerry at the table for fifteen minutes, but had to struggle a little with her to take her bath. She obediently brushed her teeth and listened to the stories I picked, but was awake for at least half an hour before she fell asleep. (I knew that because, instead of going downstairs and only checking on her, I felt I should sit with her until she slept, though I doubted I was the reason she couldn't sleep). And, when at last Bobbi and the others (who may not have been related to her at all; who knew? We hadn't exactly been introduced) returned, Kerry was asleep, the house was in order, and I was exhausted. I really wanted to go home and take a hot bath and fall asleep (between studying, trying to get Jason's attention, which I finally managed, and now wondering about the Battista family again, I was feeling pretty drained) but I knew I had to try and figure out what was going on first. I had the feeling Bobbi would tell me if I asked. Luckily, I didn't have to. Bobbi took me back upstairs when the woman had paid me, and into a bedroom I'd never seen before. I'd been given a general tour, nothing more. I couldn't tell whose room this was, since it was extremely clean, organized, and decorated in pale pastels and white (and, like the rest of the house, looked like it belonged in one of those fancy 'Mansions Weekly' magazines or something) and Bobbi and I sat on the pristine pale blue satin blanket.

"I know you've gone through our things, Claudia," Bobbi began, and held up her hand as she said my name to ward off my protests. "What is it you suspect us of, or were you just curious?" She gave me a look as direct and sharp as her approach and words, and I suddenly felt deflated. Lying was a bad idea here, and I felt like it, everything that had happened in the last month, was a burden sitting heavily on me. As if reading my mind, she added, just as tersely, "Don't bother lying, okay? This is important."

"I did," I admitted, "and I'm sorry. I was just…"

Her piercing eyes locked onto mine. "Claudia, do you know why we had to leave so suddenly tonight? Do you know why we keep secrets? It's safer that way. It's a dangerous way to live, letting everyone in on things they should be kept out of." She cocked her head. "I'll understand if you don't want to tell me why you went through our things. Admitting you did it is all I needed. In any case, I should tell you why I had to go down to the police station tonight. By any chance, were you suspicious of me? Because I've just been accused of _child abuse_."

"What?" I asked, genuinely shocked. I was surprised to hear all of this from her. I was surprised to hear that she'd been accused of it, especially since I'd only told Janine of my suspicions. Emily had already known, and now her aunt knew, too, even though all they knew was about our suspicion. We hadn't even told them all the details. But could one of them have told—

"We were also told that the person accusing me of such a horrible thing was _Claudia Kishi_ of _Stoneybrook_, _Connecticut_." Bobbi's cold tone had become hard and icy, and if looks could kill, I would literally have been dead. And buried.

My first thought was to run. Bobbi looked absolutely murderous. But I could hear footsteps on the stairs now, and whether they were to help Bobbi rid the room of my body or to protect me, I didn't know. Besides, it would only make me look guilty, and I wasn't. I had gone through their things, and Bobbi knew that. I had suspected Bobbi of abuse, even though I hadn't admitted to that. Maybe she already knew that, though. But was she sure I'd been the reason she was accused of abuse?

"I would never do something like that!" I replied, my voice harsh and surprised.

Anything Bobbi could say in reply to that was interrupted (thankfully) when the bedroom door opened (at last!) and the woman stepped inside.

Bobbi took one last look at me, eyes full of emotion so strong I began to feel as overwhelmed as I had earlier, and left. Her mother, or whoever that woman was, stood facing me. Compared to Bobbi's vicious eyes, this woman looked only half as intimidating, even though she towered over me. Like Bobbi, she was muscular and tall, and she, like Bobbi, was beautiful, in a strong, feminine, and almost powerful way. I didn't know what to do, but I wasn't about to let her intimidate me based on false accusations. I stood and faced her, knowing I was at least partially innocent. And although it was completely the wrong time to be thinking about anything other than what was happening (and it wasn't easy) I wondered if Bobbi had told the police what she knew about me. She hadn't said, and I couldn't help but think she'd accused me of accusing her of child abuse because I'd been so quiet when she'd confronted me until I could honestly defend myself. And while I felt pretty nervous (so nervous, in fact, that my hands were numb and tingly and I felt like I was going to faint) I wondered who had called in and used my name to report Bobbi. I must have known whoever it was, because they knew _me_, but only a few people knew I'd suspected Bobbi of abuse. Two, in fact. Emily had said she hadn't used my name, that she knew of, when telling her aunt what she knew. So that left Emily and Janine, and I doubted my sister was worried enough about anything other than her GPA to call the police. And I was definitely sure she wouldn't use my name to do so. She may have been a weird nerd (well, she was, and she was certainly weird) but she wasn't dishonest. That left Emily.

I was surprised when the woman simply told me that there was nothing happening there and asked me to leave, but making sure to tell me I wasn't free from any of this yet. And I didn't doubt that it was the truth. Not only had I not been officially fired (though Emily hadn't had an official confrontation with the Battista family either) but I knew there was probably a lot more to this than had already happened. I'd probably be questioned, and I had some questions of my own to ask. Who had accused Bobbi of child abuse? I knew Emily and I had been suspicious, but I definitely would have remembered leaving a tip accusing someone of something so serious and using someone else's name.

_This is just like that yin and yang thing you were thinking about a few weeks ago_, I mused, pulling a bag of chocolate-coated peanuts out from under my bed and opening the bag. I couldn't sleep anyway. I just kept thinking about everything. My mind felt like someone had turned on the spin cycle of a washing machine. Everything just kept whirling around and around, crashing into my skull and keeping me awake and tense. I was half-expecting police cars to show up and arrest me. _Innocent until proven guilty_.

For every good person, there was a bad. For all the bad in a person, there was good. Life worked that way, like black and white or yin and yang. It had started out with our accusing Bobbi, though not to the police or to anyone but each other and ourselves, and now, things had switched. We were playing each other's roles. I, the former accuser, was now the accused. Maybe my mind was just too hyped on chocolate to sleep. That, or I'd been reading too many mysteries before bed.

* * *

**Author's Note: I tried to make the end funny. I don't think it worked. Anyway, I'm sorry for the delay. The chaos of moving has already gotten to me. And, at last, something happens! And Kerry finally acts up a little! I hope this hasn't been too monotonous. I'm not sure this chapter is very good, though I'm pleased I could put it together at all. My computer has been crashing, and my 'S' has been sticking. And my mind is fried. I hate moving. Oh, well…please review! :D**


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

**POV: Bobbi**

I don't remember ever being so angry in my life.

I'd been angry plenty of times before, of course, but I don't think anything compares to being accused of hurting your own baby sister.

I'd been angry when my parents divorced. I'd been angry when my father died. I'd been even angrier when Mom started taking extra shifts and left me with taking care of Kerry, who was only five months old when our father died, and trying to keep tabs on Dahlia, who was never at home to help. When we moved, I thought things would be easier. But the chaos of packing, renting a moving van, and trying to keep Kerry entertained (which was why we now had boxes decorated in marker pictures) let Mom out of the house easily, and Dahlia escaped in the confusion. It was just easier for them to let me deal with it, and because I was sure things would change when we moved, I let them leave and I took on all the work. So I was angry when Dahlia accused me of spying, and angrier when we moved here and Mom continued her new pattern of going to work early and staying late, and Dahlia was out on dates or out with friends (she made each easily) daily. Again, this left me with a work load beyond what most seventeen-year-old girls have to deal with. And dealing with everyday pressures, like trying to graduate and the usual girl stuff, like periods and cramps, never helped.

Despite this, I was never angry at Kerry. She was doing her best, it seemed, to help me. She seemed to know that I suddenly had a lot to deal with, and that a petulant child wouldn't help matters. And I would certainly never hurt her.

But apparently, someone else didn't think so. There were many people who were possible suspects. Anyone my mother had prosecuted in the last three years who had access to a computer would know Kerry's name, and mine. Dahlia could have done it. She hated Kerry, and she definitely didn't like me. Despite being twins, we couldn't be more different. While I'd taken on the responsibility, she'd only become more careless.

However, since being accused of abusing Kerry, Dahlia had become almost human. She had seemed concerned, and had even come along when I was first questioned. The police had questioned Kerry, too, of course, and my mother and sister, but since there was nothing wrong, the police had told us that we were free to leave, but that we weren't allowed to leave town until the investigation was complete. They'd come to our house and looked around. And through all of this, Dahlia had watched Kerry (probably to avert suspicion of she'd been the one to call me in) and remained at home with us, going over every angle we could think of to figure out why I, the most responsible of my family members, would be accused of such an awful crime. And, despite Claudia claiming she was innocent, I couldn't help but wonder about her.

I knew she'd been suspicious of us for some reason. I didn't know why, but at least she'd admitted to having gone through our things. And I doubted someone who would go as far as reporting someone for a crime they had no proof of because it had never happened would admit to anything relating, or possibly relating, before reporting someone. But if Claudia had been suspicious, why had she gone through our things or seemed so surprised when I mentioned what had happened?

I hadn't meant to get so upset with her when talking to her the previous night. But it was easier to get mad at her than it was to accuse Dahlia, who was finally acting human, of lying about me to the authorities.

Besides, Claudia was 'working with' Emily Bernstein to try and figure out our situation, when all she had to do was ask. I wasn't sure who had come to whom or who had brought up my family and then realized they had us in common, but whatever had happened, Claudia wasn't telling me everything when I asked questions. I'd told her it was fine if she didn't, because secrets were all that we had as real, personal security. We had guards and aliases and all kinds of disguises and assumed identities, and none worked as well as secrets did to keep us safe. For one thing, they didn't have to be paid and couldn't be bribed into betrayal. For another, we could control them much more easily. But saying so had probably only made me look guiltier than my anger alone did, and I hoped Claudia wouldn't mention it when, and if, she was questioned.

Was it possible that Emily, our former baby-sitter, was responsible? Yes, of course it was. Almost anything was possible. She thought she knew our situation, knew someone who had gone through our things and already looked suspicious, and because Claudia had probably told Emily everything, Emily could easily use Claudia's name against me. And it wasn't like she didn't have a motive, if she wanted to be picky and bitter. I hadn't officially fired her or told her I'd find a different sitter, and now she seemed to know that Claudia had been watching Kerry. I'd listened in on a conversation between the two of them. Claudia wasn't the only one who could spy. It was how I knew, despite the fact that the footprints didn't match up, that Claudia had been spying on me, and that she hadn't done it alone. I'd removed the prints to confuse Claudia and to spare Emily from becoming involved in a situation she'd already been removed from, but she seemed to want to be involved. And if she'd been the one to call the police and tell them I was hurting a child, she was more than involved now than ever.

"Still upset?" Kerry asked, startling me. It was nearing three A.M., and I still hadn't been able to sleep. She stood still, looking ghostly in her long nightgown, in my doorway. She didn't look like she'd slept much, either, and as if explaining herself to my unspoken thoughts, she padded in and seated herself at the end of my bed. "Mom's crying."

I nodded sleepily, leaning back against my headboard. I held out my arms, and Kerry crawled over and rested against me. After a few quiet moments, she sighed and shifted sleepily. Her breathing became deep and even, and I shifted her onto my bed and covered her with my blanket. I lay there, leaning into my pillows and my head back on the headboard, awake, for quite some time after Kerry fell asleep. Then again, life is much easier when you're a little kid and don't really understand things. Kerry understood that our parents weren't really there for us anymore, and she knew Dahlia couldn't be trusted alone at home with her. That's much more than most three-year-old girls, or boys, can or should understand at that age, as far as I'm concerned.

I wanted to check on Mom, but I didn't want to disturb Kerry. Then again, I didn't want to disturb Mom, either. I hate seeing adults cry, especially in this kind of situation. Was she crying because she knew I was innocent, or because she thought I was guilty? Was she crying because she missed Dad? Was she suddenly aware of just how much pressure I'd been under? Did she know how long she'd spent at the office, or had the days blended together into a long, exhausting dreamlike sequence of days that were alike from one to the next? I felt like I wondered about my life all night long.

I must have eventually fallen asleep, because I woke up around eight. I noticed Kerry still asleep, stood with as little movement as I could, and took a long, how shower before breakfast. I noticed Mom was gone already, and Dahlia was still in bed. When Kerry was awake, I fixed her a bowl of cereal and she and I decided to go out for the day. Because the previous day, Friday, had been a pro-D day, I'd taken Kerry out to the mall. We'd both seen things we wanted, but because we were pressed for time, I'd promised we'd come back on Saturday, which was today. Then we'd been called down to the police station, and I hadn't thought much about ice-cream or anything other than who could have done this, and why.

But any thoughts of new dresses and cold treats weren't living up to what they might to most children. As I drove to the mall, with Kerry wearing her favorite pink and white sundress and white tights, and white sandals, she kept talking about what would happen if the police came. "Can they take me away? Will Mom go to jail?"

She had a lot of questions, and they weren't the kind of questions a three-year-old should have to ask, much less think about. So instead of going straight to the mall, I took the car through the A&W drive-through and parked in the parking lot with our lunch. I had some explaining to do, and I doubted a trip to the mall was going to be as needed as sorting things out for Kerry, and for myself, too.

* * *

Kerry seemed pretty tired by the time we got back home, so I helped her up to bed for a nap. And although I was feeling more than a little sleepy myself, I knew I couldn't rest yet. I was home with Kerry alone, so it was up to me, as always, to take care of her. I used to be much tenser about watching her, but after a while, it became routine. Besides, if someone reported me for sleeping, I wanted to know about it.

I was still a little upset (okay, maybe more than a little) about the allegations. It wasn't like I'd done anything to deserve them. And I definitely wanted to be awake if someone decided Kerry would be better off somewhere else until I was proven innocent. Although I'd done my best to reassure her (even though she didn't really understand all of what was going on, and I knew that because I didn't, either) I wasn't completely sure that the authorities couldn't take Kerry and put her into a foster home or something.

"Are you nervous, honey?" Mom asked, startling me and causing me to flinch. My hand hit the remote control for the TV, and the channels changed from _Ghost Girl_ to _Mythbusters._

"More than a little," I replied, and we shared a tense laugh. She set a bag of groceries down on the glass coffee table and sat down on the other side of the couch, on the cushion farthest from me. (This wasn't hard, since I was sitting at the far end on my side.)

"I know you would never hurt Kerry," Mom said, surprising me. Unlike most mothers and daughters, she and I have never been close. We don't talk (aside from 'Pass the salt' or a polite, 'How was school?') on a regular basis, and our conversations are nothing short of brief and formal. "I know that it's likely someone who has a grudge with me has done this, and used the name of someone we know simply to get 'two birds with one stone,' as the saying goes. Tell me, do you think someone could have singled out Claudia Kishi for a reason?"

I sighed hesitantly. "She was looking around in here once when she was watching Kerry," I admitted. "I guess it's possible someone found out and thinks it means Claudia was suspicious of something, and decided that since Claudia already looked somewhat guilty, already had a point against her…that doing this would be even worse for her because she's already seemed untrustworthy."

Mom nodded thoughtfully. "Yes, that sounds reasonable. Did Claudia ever explain what she was looking for? She may not have been suspicious at all."

I shrugged. "It's my fault that she didn't. We were talking about secrets, and somehow I ended up telling her it wouldn't matter if she told me. And in a way, it wouldn't. She didn't find whatever she was looking for, or she would have been asking questions. Or she might have come back looking for something else. But I think she's innocent of slander, anyway."

"Why do you think that?"

"When I told her why I'd been called down to the police station for questioning, I could see it in her eyes that she was really surprised. Horrified, almost. But curious, too, so I assume she really did suspect me. And even if she did think I was hurting Kerry, I could tell she wasn't the one who lied. I think she must have told someone else. Maybe the story got around, or maybe one person who just thought they were doing the right thing, just in case, did it. In any case, I think I should call Claudia and apologize."

Mom was quiet for a few seconds, and then she nodded. "Bobbi, don't worry, okay? Everything is going to be just fine." She sounded like she was trying to convince herself of this, and even I, known by friends back home for being somewhat dense (apparently because I pay too much attention to detail and schoolwork) could see that she was just as unsure and concerned and upset as I was. Before I could mention Kerry's questions, which I doubted Mom could answer despite being a lawyer, which is what I call her even though her job is so personal with the law firm (because it's a family business, I guess) it doesn't have a name, she stood up, picked up the bag of groceries and headed for the kitchen. I thought I could see the beginnings of tears forming in her eyes.

_Great. This is just perfect. I could probably deal with having to raise a little girl, and keep tabs on the slutty sister and workaholic mother, but I really doubt I can take having to pretend everything will be fine for an emotional mother who isn't even there for me. Or for my sisters._

I immediately felt bad. I knew Mom worked hard for her own reasons (running my father's firm; keeping the same amount of money coming in every month; dealing with the grief of his death) and that dealing with a petulant teenager wouldn't help. Even so, I felt my own thoughts were justifiable. It's hard to be a part of a fight, or situation, when you can see both sides of it too easily. And grief is something that never completely goes away. My mother would forever miss my father, even if she remarried and her life became just as it was when I was fourteen. I would forever miss him, too. He was perfect; strong and protective and fiercely loving. He never embarrassed me (publicly, anyway) and seemed to understand me even if I didn't say anything, or how hard I tried hiding how I felt or what I thought. You don't just stop missing people like that. And Dahlia was even closer to him than I had been. Even Dahlia would never stop missing him, no matter how much duct tape she used on her shoes or how much gel she used in her hair.

I checked on Kerry and sat down in the rocking chair beside her bed, unaware that, at that exact moment, she was dreaming of our father. I pulled a notebook and pen from the bookcase beside her nightstand and flipped it open to a fresh page.

For several years, I'd wanted to write about the day I'd been told my father was never coming back. Despite how much it hurt to think about it, I had decided it might be nice to write a 'Grief Guide,' for other kids who had just lost their parents. And even though I nearly cry every time I thought about that gorgeous spring day when Mom got the awful phone call (I still cringe sometimes when the phone rings) I knew writing down what I could remember while I still could was a good idea.

_It was one of those perfect spring days—Dahlia and I were out in the front yard of our house, throwing a ball back and forth while Kerry, almost six months old, watched with interest from her carriage. It was warmer than it had been in months, and we weren't the only one taking advantage of the clear blue skies. Mr. Bryant from next door was washing his car. A dog was barking in someone's backyard. The smells of barbeques drifted through the neighborhood,__ and children splashed through the sprinklers and shrieked in the backyard pools. A cute guy, a little older than Dahlia and I were (we were fourteen, he was sixteen) was blasting music on his front steps and watering the flowers his mother had asked him to take care of. Butterflies flitted from one garden to the next. We lived in a pretty nice neighborhood at the time, since Mom and Dad made so much money. I remember inhaling the sweet scent of the flowers and hot dogs, and turning toward the front door as it opened and the fresh smell of homemade cookies drifted out for all to want. Mom smiled and waved at us, and reminded Dahlia of soccer practice and me of my gymnastics lesson. As she turned, we heard the phone ring and didn't think anything of it. We guessed our father, who had gone to the store for milk, was calling to ask whether we needed eggs or bread as well. But after a few minutes, Mom called us inside. We were a little surprised and annoyed, since it was finally so warm out. But something in Mom's voice made us obey. I picked up Kerry's baby seat and carried it up the stairs. Mom was waiting for us in the kitchen, facing us. Her face was streaked with tea_—

I couldn't finish. How could I write that Mom was crying, and that, in shock, I almost dropped Kerry's basket? How could I write that my father had been killed?

I wiped a tear I hadn't noticed from the page and watched the last few lines in the notebook smear. I didn't care. I remembered the day perfectly. I remembered every detail perfectly. And for once, I really wished I could just forget everything.

* * *

**Author's Note: This chapter seemed to take FOREVER to write. It felt a little pointless, too, since she was just accused of abusing her sister and can think only of the flowers in their old neighborhood. Let's just say she's in shock. Please review! The next chapter is going to be very interesting (I hope it will be, anyway; I have to go write up my ideas for it now or it might be another boring filler!) and anyway, I'm greedy with the feedback. :P**


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

"I'm calling to apologize," were the first words I heard on Sunday morning. _Early_ Sunday morning. I had answered my phone groggily at six-fifteen A.M., still half-asleep, and without even a hello, someone had told me they wanted to apologize.

So, instead of saying 'what for' or 'who is this,' as most people might if they got an apology call or any call before seven A.M., I mumbled something incomprehensible with a voice still dry and crackly from seven-and-a-half hours of sleep.

"Claudia?" the voice replied. "Were you asleep?"

"No," I said, having cleared my throat and realized I was on the phone. "Aren't all teenagers nocturnal?"

She laughed. I knew by then that it was Bobbi, and sat up. I rubbed at my eyes and glanced around, squinting into the black gloom of my bedroom to make out the invisible shapes of my dresser and nightstand as the first pale, pink rays of sunlight began to creep over the mountain. "I'm sorry. Should I call back later?"

"No, it's okay. I can talk," I replied, suddenly intrigued. Had she mentioned something about an apology? I couldn't remember. I've never really been a morning person, and middle-of-the-night (so late it was early) phone calls have never been my thing.

"Well, I realized that I was pretty unfair to you the other day. My life is sometimes stressful, so I tend to jump to conclusions. And I know it wasn't right to believe you reported me wrongfully when the only evidence we had of that was that someone used your name, and in my life, the chances of that happening are unfortunately high."

(How could she use such big words before the sun was even over the trees? I could barely keep my eyes open.)

"So I'm sorry," Bobbi continued, "and I hope you aren't upset."

"I'm not," I replied, and I meant it. "I can't imagine being in your situation, and especially since you're only three years older than I am. I would have jumped to the same conclusion, since it seemed to be the only one. Are you apologizing because I'm a little younger?"

"No," Bobbi answered, and sighed. "But if you can stay awake, I would like to talk to you." She sounded slightly nervous, and I wondered whether or not talking to each other (given the circumstances) was against the law. I pushed the thought aside.

I'd done enough illegal things in this set of circumstances already, and as Bobbi's mother (which is what I decided to call her, since jumping to conclusions had been a big part of my life lately anyway) had put it, "You aren't out of this situation yet."

"Okay," I replied, and swung my bare feet out of bed. I reached down to pick up a bag on the floor by my nightstand (hidden under my math book) and pulled out several boxes. One of Willocrisps, one of Macaroons, and two Twinkies, which are my favorites. I expected Bobbi to do a lot of the talking (she had said she called to talk, not to listen) and she did. I took small bites, just in case, knowing I would do at least a little of the talking.

"I know you must have suspected me of something," Bobbi began, "because people don't generally go through other people's things without a reason of some kind. And you never struck me as the kind who was simply curious enough to snoop, and we ran enough background checks on you to ensure you weren't a reporter hired to dig up any news-worthy information on us. And few teenagers risk what little trust they may have managed to earn on something like this. Few would bother at all." Bobbi hesitated. "Do you think you can tell me why you went through our things? Did you suspect me of abusing Kerry?"

"Yes," I admitted, feeling a little stupid. "I probably wouldn't have if not for Emily, that girl who used to watch Kerry. She goes to my school and we just got talking…I don't know how much you know about me. Can I ask how you always seemed to know everything?"

"We have a lot of money. We can hire people to find things out."

"I'm talking about the things I was thinking. Things I did without any action or words. Like when we spied on you; how did you know?"

"Besides the obvious clues you two left in the snow, you mean? This isn't the first time we've been spied on. I just knew you two would try something, so I disabled several of our traps." She hesitated again. "And those traps, by the way, are not illegal. Just so you know." She sounded so matter-of-fact, so perfectly in-control and calm about it all that I knew she was telling me the truth. I knew from years of reading mysteries (and lately, more intense ones) that some people lie to keep themselves 'safe' from the law, if they happen to break it, and that in this situation, it was likely. And yet, I believed her.

"How about we play a game? I'll ask a question, you answer, and then you can ask me a question. I'm sure, since you were curious enough to look, that you have questions."

"Okay. Since you just asked one, I have to ask: who is that girl who looks like you? And who was that woman? I never see you with a parent or adult of any kind, and suddenly I see one and you don't tell me who she is…" (I was starting to realize I sounded a little nosy and trailed off, hoping she wouldn't point it out again.)

"That's Dahlia, my twin. Nobody sees much of her. She likes to think she's mysterious, as if we need anything more like that in life right now. And that woman was my mother. I told you the first time you can to watch Kerry that she worked a lot, didn't I?"

"Yes, and it still seemed pretty strange that you could be about to graduate, keep a perfect house and a perfect sister in order without any help. That was where Emily got the idea that you must have been doing something to hurt Kerry to keep her behaving so perfectly." I was finding it much easier now than ever to relax and talk. I hadn't even been aware of how much stress the situation had put me under until it started lifting off, like the weight of the future had been resting on my shoulders. I supposed I'd began to think it was, since, after a while, it felt like Kerry's future relied on me.

"Our father was killed when she was a baby," Bobbi replied, after a short, comfortable silence. "It's hard to imagine that someone not even six months old could be so affected by the death of the father who works, but it really did affect her. When Dad died, it was like a little of each of us went with him. And it took more out of Mom than I thought possible. So I started taking care of Kerry when I was fourteen, when she was just a baby. When we moved again, and here we are. And I'm still taking care of Kerry. I remember the last few minutes of my childhood like they were yesterday. And I haven't really been a child since." She had started to sound a little breathless, like she was trying to say more than her mouth could handle. Or maybe she was trying not to cry. In any case, when she lapsed into silence again, I tried, and failed, to come up with something to ask, more to distract us from thoughts of death. I considered telling her I'd lost family members and friends, too, but I doubted it would help. People used to tell me those things when I'd lost someone, and I would sit there and think, _you know, you really aren't helping me…_but I didn't want to say anything because although they weren't helping, they were trying.

"Well, I think we've said basically all there is to say," Bobbi said, before I could say anything, "and I feel a little better now that everything is out in the open."

"Not everything," I replied, before I could stop myself. I sighed a little. I hadn't really wanted to clear _everything_ up right then, but I decided as Bobbi waited for my explanation that honesty was the best policy.

"What do you mean?" Bobbi prompted.

"Well, I didn't know right away that you had guard dogs," I began. "And it wasn't until we were too far onto your property until I found out. It was the second time we came over unannounced that I brought those dog treats. I borrowed them from a girl I used to be pretty close with. She's been pretty depressed lately. I think she might have had something to do with the dogs that were sick. Five of them, anyway. We only came over to spy twice, and one dog was poisoned after we'd decided not to come back. When I asked her about it, though, she hung up. I haven't heard from her since."

"Well, I believe you on that," Bobbi replied, "mostly because you admitted to it so openly. But you may want to bring those over here. I'll have someone analyze them, and powder the bag for fingerprints. You _do_ still have them, don't you?"

"Yeah. I thought it might be against the law to throw them out. I mean, at first I thought I'd need them again, but when I found out they were making the dogs sick, I decided I'd just hide them in case I ever had the chance to talk to you like this. But I should tell you, my fingerprints may not be on that bag. I was wearing gloves."

"Okay. You know something? I'm glad I finally decided to call you. I was debating about whether or not it was legal, and what you might say…I was expecting you to be angry…but I'm glad we spoke," Bobbi said. "And I hope, when things clear up a little, you might consider coming back to watch Kerry. She really likes you, and as strange as it is, considering everything, I trust you, Claudia."

"Thank you," I replied, flattered. "And I'm glad we spoke, too."

I pictured Bobbi smiling. It sounded like she was. "Great. Well, I should go. We've been talking a while, and Mom has wanted to spend as much time as she can with us lately. Guilt, I guess. In any case, I enjoy it. Have a nice day!"

When we hung up, I sighed in relief. I still wasn't sure whether or not I was in trouble, or whether or not Kerry could be taken away from her family based on the accusations someone had lodged using my name, but I did feel better. And not very tired anymore, either. I decided to get up, take a shower, and have some breakfast. The chocolate I'd eaten hadn't been that filling, and anyway, I was in too good a mood for eating just once.

"Why are you up so early?" Janine asked suspiciously, when I bounced into the kitchen twenty minutes later with a towel wrapped around my shoulders to keep my wet hair from soaking the back of the white tank top and lacy white skirt I'd decided to wear. (My hair wasn't long enough to soak my skirt, but if it dripped, it might.)

"Because I think things are going to get better," I replied, eying the crisp, pale blue blouse Janine was wearing with a matching, pleated skirt that hung from her straight frame and to just below her knees. "What's with you? Did you get a job as a secretary I didn't know about?" The truth is that Janine has always worn clothes that make her look like she's a thirty-six year old woman. The kind of woman who might work as a secretary or as a news reporter, without the makeup and jewelry. I still enjoy teasing her about it sometimes. She just turned seventeen, but dresses like she's much older, and not in the sophisticated, stylish, or sexy way most girls might.

Janine scowled, but neither of us continued with the bickering. I was actually a little nervous that Janine had actually been the one to use my name against Bobbi, but as I looked at her, I mentally crossed her off the list of suspects. Janine, even if boring and conservative, wouldn't do something like that. For one thing, she was hardly imaginative enough to use someone else's name, and for another, she would want to use her own because, if ever she won the Nobel Peace Prize for curing a disease nobody had ever even caught yet, she'd want everyone to know she'd also helped put a criminal behind bars as a teenager. Besides that, Janine didn't care much about anything other than science, even if, for some inexplicable reason (Janine would probably have a technical explanation for it, just to prove me wrong) she seemed interested in Lynn, our cousin, and visitors when we occasionally had them. Who knew the human computer even needed a social status?

I decided to spend the rest of the day away from home. Thinking was driving me crazy. (Janine would probably say it's why my grades used to be so low.) So with the idea of putting as much distance between my house, my thoughts, and myself as I could, I caught a bus and headed downtown. I'd been out on four dates with Jason in the last three weeks, and as nice as they had been (romantic comedy movies in the theatre, dinner at a restaurant, and twice, a walk and a quick snack from A&W or the nearest Dairy Queen, whichever was closest) I had decided I needed a day to myself. As nice as it was to have a social life beyond baby-sitting, it was nice to just have a few hours alone once in a while. Besides, Valentine's Day was coming up and I wanted to buy Lynn one of those soft pink teddy bears, even if she did end up using it as a pillow or a chew toy.

As it turned out, the day was perfect. I found a rack of discount dresses (perfect for an art project, either as a smock or as the project itself) and bought several. I found a gift shop ready for the upcoming holiday and bought a set of cute little teddy bears for my cousin. And when I stopped for lunch, there had been a chemical spill (some employees who snuck away to make out spilled some Windex, by the sounds of it) so everyone who'd gone to that restaurant for lunch, even those of us just arriving, were sent to the next food court outlet for a meal paid for by the first outlet. And after lunch, I found a movie I'd wanted to see that I could finally afford tickets to, and spent a nice afternoon snacking on popcorn and cream soda in a dark, warm (compared to the rest of the mall, anyway) movie theatre.

When I got home, I found that Mom and Dad were home early and both had good news. Dad's good news was that he'd gotten a pizza for supper. Mom's good news was that the local library wanted to promote her from being a librarian to library supervisor, which apparently paid much better.

After our quick (and tasty) supper, I retreated to my room. I told them I had homework, even though I knew as well as they did that I had done it all on Friday night. (The old Claudia would have put it off. The new me knew better and enjoyed having whole weekends for having fun.) I wanted to be alone, though. I turned up the volume on _Blade_, which I'd never outgrown, and flopped down on my bed with a glass of chocolate milk and _Blood Filth_, a mystery about a girl my age who has to track down a killer (her father, but she doesn't know it yet) who stole the only vaccine for a pandemic outbreak that he thinks is a biological weapon. I've gotten to the fourth chapter on it, but every time I want to read, I'm interrupted.

I had just finished the fifth chapter (finally!) when my bedside phone rang. Feeling accomplished, I answered cheerfully.

"Claudia? What did you tell that Bobbi girl?" was the reply. It sounded like Kristy, and reluctantly remembering that I'd given Bobbi enough information on Kristy to arm her for a peaceful retaliation (a phone call, by the sounds of it) I was guessing Bobbi had called Kristy, who was now upset with me.

"The truth," I decided. "Because you didn't tell me how those dog treats I borrowed from you ended up poisoning five dogs, I told them you did it. I mean, I know how the dogs were poisoned. I fed them to the dogs. But everyone think you poisoned the treats."

"How could you do that, Claudia? I would never hurt an animal!"

"Well, then you'd better tell me how those treats really ended up being poisoned, or you'll have a permanent record of this with the Stoneybrook Police Department." I retorted, sounding like the defense attorney from my favorite comedy-drama TV show, _S.P.U.D._ (Stamford Police Undercover Department) and speaking to Kristy the way nobody in the past would have dared to.

"I…I don't know how they were poisoned," Kristy sputtered, and I mused silently about how, for once, she wasn't in control of a situation and didn't like it. I knew she hadn't been in control of things before, like her mother's remarriage and divorce, but she was almost always in control of things she and I, or she and anyone her age or younger, said or did. "I really don't know, Claudia. And I'm surprised you'd think I would."

Her voice had softened. For the first time in a long time, she sounded emotional.

"You know, life can be really depressing. I know I had nothing to do with a lot of the bad things that seemed to happen within my family. I was upset at first about the first divorce, my mother's remarriage, and the second divorce. She's been dating again. And…and then my club fell apart. And Stacey died. And our friends moved away. And I know I was rude to you after that, but it was like you being here mocked everything we had. I kept waiting for you to leave. Then I'd be really alone, and I thought I'd deserve it if it did happen. And when you didn't, and things didn't return to normal, I got depressed. But I would never hurt anyone or anything, Claudia."

"Well, I'm sorry life sucks, but I thought it was much worse for someone else," I replied. "I've still been baby-sitting, you know. There's been no reason you and I couldn't have kept the BSC going. It was just too hard at first to sit there and know several of our members just weren't there, and might never be there again."

"So you decide that because the dog treats I gave you were poisoned, I'd gone overboard and become murderous? There are plenty of others you should be suspicious of." With that, leaving me confused and annoyed and more than a little hyper on anger, emotion, and adrenaline, she hung up.

* * *

_I have to call Emily,_ I thought, when the phone was back in the cradle. _I have to ask her some questions_. I had to know whether or not she and her aunt had called Bobbi in. And if not, I'd be sure to tell Bobbi, because I'd left her hanging on the subject that morning.

"Hello?" Emily asked.

"Emily? Did you or anyone you know call the police about Bobbi?"

"No, not that I know of…why? Something happen?"

"Yes. She was called down to the police station, because someone called in to report her of possible child abuse, and they used my name. So I have to ask, just because not many people other than the two of us know we suspected anything."

"Well, I didn't," Emily replied, "but I should ask my aunt. Be right back."

I heard the click as she set the phone down, and I considered her words. She'd sounded convincingly innocent when I'd told her why I was asking (I'd even heard her gasp, although since we'd suspected her anyway, I wondered why) and I doubted Emily would have done something like that, used my name if she had, or not called to tell me sooner if she did do it.

"My aunt didn't tell anyone," Emily said, when she returned, "but she asked if she should. I said no…should I tell her we think she should?"

"No! No more," I said, and we laughed weakly.

"Well, I should be going," Emily replied. "I've been so busy with the school newspaper that I'd forgotten to read that book for English. Anyway, keep me updated, okay?" We hung up, and I relaxed into my pillows, propped against my headboard.

I got up, found Janine heading to the bathroom, and asked to use her computer. She looked so annoyed that I would ask that she sighed like I'd just asked to borrow fifty dollars and nodded. (Had she slumped any further forward, or sighed any harder as she did, she'd have put a peephole into the bathroom wall.) I might have made a joke about her posture being a result of so many years hunched over a computer, but I didn't bother. I needed to make a list, and I needed it done in a way that I'd be able to read it when I was done, even if I did have to hide it from everyone else. Putting it in my closet, where the poisoned treats and sneakers I'd used to sneak onto Battista property were kept would be perfect. It was turning into a safe spot for all kinds of 'unlawful' things.

After typing up a list of suspects in the whole situation (_Bobbi, Dahlia, Kristy, Emily, Janine, and Emily's aunt_) I added the motives for each. Kristy was bitter and depressed; that was easy. Next up, Emily, who suspected something and felt it confirmed when never called back to watch Kerry. The list went on. Emily's aunt might think she was doing the right thing, as adults always think. Janine might think it would look good on a résumé or give her a social life. I'd put Bobbi's name down simply because she was involved. As an afterthought, I added my own name to the list. Beside my name, and next to Bobbi's, I added an asterisk. I printed up the page, made sure I hadn't saved a copy to Janine's machine, and hid it in my closet.

Suddenly aware of just how long a day it had been, I managed to put my pajamas on, rake my brush through my hair a few times, and fell into bed. I think I was asleep before I hit the pillow.

Around two A.M., I suddenly became aware of a sound a little like popcorn popping. I stood up cautiously and looked around, wondering if the house was on fire. It seemed especially loud by the dresser, and I paused. I pulled my ghostly white curtains, seeming to glow in the moonlight, from the window and jerked in surprise as a small handful of pebbles hit the glass right in front of me. I pushed the window open, and the curtains billowed around me. Hardly dressed for the late January night air, I shivered in my favorite purple satin nightgown. I leaned over the windowsill and strained to see into the darkness, but I could only make out a vague shape on the driveway below.

"Claudia?" a somewhat familiar voice asked, and I flinched. Whoever it was knew me.

"Claudia, if that's you, can you please come outside? I have to talk to you."

Against intelligence, I threw my longest coat over my shoulders and crept downstairs, hoping I wouldn't wake anyone up. On the front porch, I found Ashley Wyeth waiting for me, shivering in a light sweat set and gripping a wallet.

"Ashley?" I clarified, and the girl silhouetted against the street light nodded.

"Claudia, I think I can help you. I know a lot about the Battista family situation, and if I help you, I need you to help me," she replied, in a rush. She sounded nervous. And cold.

"Okay, but come in," I said, and she did without hesitation.

"I know Dahlia Battista," Ashley began, when I'd locked the front door and we'd closed ourselves into Mom's home office. "And I know she called the police on Bobbi. She said she did it because Bobbi's always hogging the spotlight, and if she wants the spotlight, she'll get it. Dahlia said this was a 'gift' for Bobbi, and that if I told anyone, she'd make sure everyone knew about my uncle. That's who I'm staying with." She was still talking quickly, and she looked nervous. In the light, I could see that she was pale and shivering. She didn't look ragged at all, but the look of panic and fear in her eyes said more than enough. "My uncle used to be abusive. Just when he was drunk. But now I'm staying with him and he doesn't like it because I knew him before he got sober, and now he has a kid and he's nervous I'll think he's abusive if he punishes them at all and turn him in. But in the past, he was abusive to me. Bobbi's mother prosecuted him, and he and Dahlia are kind of working together on this. He wants revenge, and she's already been getting hers by having Bobbi take on a huge work load. But because Dahlia's still bitter, she's willing to help. I just thought you should know all this."

"Wait, what? Really?" My mind whirled with all of this new information, more than I'd ever had to process at once before.

Ashley nodded. "Okay, I told you what I know. Now, to help me, I need you to make sure nothing bad happens to Bobbi or her family by helping me make sure Dahlia and my uncle can't do anything else to them. I don't doubt spreading lies about the family is below them. Call me at the number I gave you if you must," she added, waving the phone and inching towards the door, "but don't tell anyone else any of this yet. They'll hurt me if they know I know, or that I told someone else. I overheard them talking about kidnapping Kerry and making it look like a 'police intervention,'" Ashley added, "so if you hear something like that, call me. I think I know where they'll take Kerry if they take her, so be sure to call."

As quickly as she'd come, she was gone. And it left me dazed and with more questions than I could comprehend, much less guess the answers to.

* * *

**Author's Note: Perhaps a long chapter, and weird, but at least something happened…and I have an idea for the next one, too. Anyway, THANK YOU to everyone who has reviewed so far! 32 reviews is the most I've ever gotten! This is the most rewarding story I've ever tried before, so thank you SO much! :D**


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

I slammed my locker door shut on Monday morning and sighed. Slamming the heavy doors is necessary to close them, because our school is so old. But I'd just been asked to help design the decorations for the upcoming Valentine's Day dance, and although I'd agreed, I was a little nervous about it. I'd been to enough dances in the past to know that having a date or going with friends wasn't necessary, but I'd felt okay about going alone to those dances because I'd had friends I could have gone with. This time, I would actually go alone if I decided to go at all. Emily's relatives would be coming into town for a few days, and she wouldn't be able to come. And although I have a few other 'sort-of friends' from the time I was 'degraded' (which is what I call being pushed back into seventh grade from eighth) I don't have many who could go to the ninth-grade dance.

If Jason Ceralle asked me to go, I might. But it wasn't really fair to him if I said I'd go and then had a baby-sitting job or emergency to work with. It was unlikely that Janine would short-circuit and need repairs, but who knew? Besides, I'd spent most of Sunday night tossing and turning, dreaming that Kerry was taken by city officials. It was unlikely, I hoped, but again, who knew? I half-expected a confirmation call from Bobbi.

So I wanted to keep my time as free as I could, just in case.

In the past, Kristy might have seen it as me being lazy. She'd probably have organized some kind of 'Cheer Up Claudia' campaign and involved everyone she could think of or introduce to the BSC. And although I would have probably been annoyed even then, I would have known she was doing it for me and been grateful. Now, things had changed. I wouldn't have been able to tolerate such a thing, and although I was a one-girl baby-sitting service, I still liked kids. There should have been too much work for me, but a lot of our old clients had done what the BSC members had done: split up, moved away, died…so now I still had several familiar families to work for, and several new ones. It was nice, since I had less work and made more money. Kristy, the old one, would have been proud.

"So, I seriously needed an escape last night," a girl said, talking conversationally but loudly to the group of girls around her. "I was watching that baby again, that Newton kid, and I was _so bored._"

I clenched my teeth. 'That Newton baby' happened to be Lucy, a former sitting charge of the BSC. Her parents had decided when her brother, Jamie, went to kindergarten that she needed sitters available all day, like a home-based day-care center. Unfortunately for Lucy, it sounded like her new sitter was Brittany Ziegler, someone who was not only superficial and annoying, but available at the time hours I was. Perhaps less, since cheerleading practice must take up at least a little time. Needless to say, Brittany is one of the popular girls, one of the kinds often found in a clique of girls wearing makeup and their nicest clothes. Why they'd get all dressed up for school is beyond me. The school was renovated over the summer, and I have to admit it looks much nicer, but it's still school, even if it does appeal more to the eyes now than the red brick building ever did.

"Ugh, _again_?" one of the other girls in the group moving like molasses down the hall and taking up enough space for a moving truck (they'd be offended if someone said that one out loud; they're all on diets and try to walk like the models, thrusting their hips forward and hoping their 'barely-breasts' look much bigger than they are) said in a voice so high I'm surprised glass didn't shatter. "Seriously, Britt, you need to find some new clients. The babies are cute, but it's the jobs like with the Pikes that'll bring in the coins."

(If violence was legal, I'd have punched both of the girls who'd been speaking. Baby-sitting isn't supposed to be fun, at least not for the girl baby-sitting. It's serious. And it definitely isn't all about the money. Kids can get hurt easily because almost anything can be a toy, if you think about it in perspective, and by the sounds of it, Brittany had spent the previous evening on the phone with a boy while she was supposed to be watching Lucy, who is almost a year old. She was bragging that the boy had asked her to the Valentine's dance, and instead of asking what Lucy did while Brittany was apparently so busy, her idiot friends were congratulating her and talking about 'needing' to go shopping for new shoes and dresses and makeup.)

But instead, I clenched my jaw and headed for math class, where, to top off a wonderful morning, the teacher announced a pop quiz.

And to think anyone can _like_ school.

* * *

Needless to say, I didn't do well on the pop quiz. Not that I expected to; my grades had begun to slip slightly in the previous six weeks. In fact, since taking the job with the Battista family, my whole life seemed to be slipping slowly downward. But it had been months since I'd had to face the reality of a big, red _C_ at the top of a page and the annoying little teacher comments in the margins of my paper. _You can do better than this, Claudia. Talk to me if you need help understanding the material. Please pick up a worksheet to take home and hand it in before class tomorrow._

It had been months since I'd needed one of those worksheets. Or read those comments. Hopefully, my parents wouldn't notice that my grades had become my old average (in math, anyway; I was still doing well in science; who would have guessed?) since they'd been too busy to notice much of anything. I couldn't remember whether they'd always been so interested in work or whether they had just gotten something they were trying to pay off. In any case, their absence in my life wasn't completely annoying, since it sometimes came in handy.

After school, I took my math worksheet (the high school seemed to give out worksheets in all subjects as homework, along with review questions, essays, and book reports, but mostly worksheets) to the library. It was much warmer than it had been, and for some reason (global warming?) the flowers in the brick barriers were blooming. I took a seat next to the low stone wall (the flowers were right next to the wall, between the low, parallel brick wall next to me and the one bordering the grassy hill) and pulled out my books. I used to put off my homework until the last possible second, but I've found I like the freedom doing it right away gives me. Besides, I had a sitting job for the Perkins girls that night, and I was looking forward to spending time with them.

When at last I stood to stretch, I was startled by a voice from behind me.

"How long have you been here?" Mom asked, jogging up to me with a big smile and a paper bag.

"A while," I admitted, checking my watch. "An hour, I guess. Homework."

"Ah. Well, I brought you some cookies from the morning staff meeting," Mom replied, "and I can drive you home if you're still here in an hour."

"Okay. I'm about done my math, but I have to read the last chapter for _The Third Magic_, and I have some research to do on atoms."

Mom smiled and nodded.

"Oh, and I got a _C_ on today's pop quiz," I added.

Mom's smile faded. She gave me a lecture disguised as a pep-talk and hurried back inside. I sat down and opened my math book, and a small, folded sheet of notebook paper flew out. I snatched it out of the air and unfolded it.

_C__laudia,_

_I__ know you've been busy lately being a bitch, but would you mind doing me a favor and at__ least replying to let me know you're still human? I have to talk to you right away._

I recognized Kristy's writing, but I kept staring at the tenth and worst word in the note. Clearly, Kristy wasn't about to let what I'd told Bobbi (honestly, I'd figured) go.

I sighed, finished my worksheet, took notes on the final chapter of the book Mr. Pisange (who was teased a lot for the way his last name sounded) had instructed us all to finish, and found a book several inches thick on the subject of atoms. Then, wondering if I should, and wondering especially about how Kristy had managed to sneak that note into my book without my knowing, I carefully began writing a reply note for Kristy, but it ended up a little more like a letter than a note.

_K__risty,_

_I__ know you hate that I told Bobbi what I did about you, but you have to know I thought I was telling her the truth. You left me no choice in the matter. You hung up on me when I asked, so what else was I to think? And from now on, you can leave notes for me in my mailbox at home, as I have no desire at all to ever see you face-to-face again. I'm doing what I think is best, and all I can say is that what you do in your life is your own business, and that I can understand some of what you've been going through (because I have, too) but when what you do in your life hurts someone else, it becomes other people's business. And you should GET OVER the fact that life has changed. Calling me names isn't going to help. So you'll be bitter until you die? Great. Just keep yourself and your attitude away from me. I have enough to deal with right now, and I have to stay as cheerful as I can to keep from going insane on you, in this note, right now._

I didn't bother to sign it. She would know, and not just by my writing, who it was from. I reread it and cringed; I sounded harsh and cruel. Remembering what she'd called me, though, I decided against rewriting it. So I told Mom I'd walk home, and detoured towards Kristy's when the library was out of sight. I was going to deliver it myself, and stopped to write Kristy's name on the piece of paper. (I had to use a light pole to put the paper on.) I folded it, slipped it into the mailbox at the end of the long driveway I'd been up countless times, and hurried away. If Kristy was home, I didn't want her to see me delivering it.

As if luck was out to bite me, I saw Kristy a moment later.

She wasn't on the bus, as usual. She was walking. And unless I ducked into a bush or made a run for it in the opposite direction, I was going to meet up with her, just as I'd said I hoped wouldn't happen. And when she saw me, she looked like she was considering making a run for it, too. But she didn't.

"Hey!" she called, and started towards me.

_Should I run_? I wondered. But for some reason, I didn't want to. I didn't know what Bobbi had said to her (for all I knew, she'd still been upset and made up a lie about me as revenge) but I felt I should stay and hear her out. Besides, she wouldn't do anything to me in broad daylight, I hoped.

So I stayed where I was.

But Kristy, despite wanting to talk, neared me and stopped. Then, as if a wild wolf had just erupted from my chest, she turned and bolted. Her brown ponytail bounced wildly as she scrambled over the rocks, but that didn't stop her. She kept going until she disappeared into the trees, and I remained frozen to the sidewalk under my feet, confused.

Confused…about much more than Kristy's erratic behavior.

* * *

"I've been cleared!" Bobbi sounded exuberant, and I felt like cheering with her. "I've been cleared of the abuse allegations! I'll probably have a permanent note of this on my record forever, but at least I wasn't convicted and won't be sentenced to life in prison."

"Great!" I said, and I meant it. "And…I really didn't accuse you of anything."

"I know. Well, I'm pretty sure. I know there are more than a few people who would, though, and using your name is just one of the many ways it could have happened. You just happened to be one of the newest additions to people working with us, so of course, due to the lack of accumulated trust, you were the easiest target."

I didn't understand most of that, but I did understand that she believed me. I felt better about that, and extremely happy that Bobbi had been cleared of abuse. It was like the magical end to the horrible wait I hadn't even known about. I hadn't even known what I was waiting for, much less that I was waiting, so suddenly knowing it was over made me feel so much better. I felt like several tons of weight had been lifted off of me. Like when your sinuses are finally clear after a bad cold. Breathing never felt so good.

"What did you tell that girl I told you about yesterday morning?" I asked, remembering the early weekend morning phone call. "Kristy. She's been hunting me lately, trying to ask me about what I told you about her."

"I told her that we had enough evidence to prove she was responsible for poisoning our dogs," Bobbi replied. "We found her prints all over that bag, and the detectives are still trying to work out that poison. It's either homemade, rare, or too old to be of any use. Why didn't you come to me with it right away?"

"I would have, but it would have meant admitting I'd been on your property and trying to keep the dogs from alerting you to my presence," I replied, pleased that I could use words her size. "And even if coming to you right away with it would have meant I probably hadn't done anything associated with the incident, I still felt responsible."

"Well, if it makes you feel any better, the dogs will be fine," Bobbi said. "All but one has recovered fully, and the sixth is expected to need care for a while yet. The poison of the sixth dog was of a different nature, so we know almost for sure that if Kristy did it, she would have needed access to illegal chemicals or a seriously guarded laboratory."

."Okay," I replied, already wondering if Ashley's uncle could have been supplying Kristy with poison. My mind wandered again to Ashley, who I couldn't help but think was lying. Her story had seemed pretty unlikely—perhaps concocted hastily before she arrived at my house overnight?

"Oh, Bobbi? I should tell you something else," I said, just as she sighed and said, "But I fear our troubles aren't over yet."

"You go first," we both said in unison.

Then we both laughed at the same time, which only made us laugh harder. It felt good to laugh, especially with Bobbi, who I doubted had the chance to laugh often.

"A girl I used to know came over in the middle of the night last night," I told her, and told her everything else Ashley had told me. Even if it was all lies, maybe she could convince her mother to check and see if anyone she'd prosecuted in the last thirteen years was a man with the last name of Wyeth. If so, maybe the rest of the story was true.

"Really? That kind of sounds a little like what I was about to tell you," Bobbi began. "Dahlia has been leaving the house late at night. Now, if it was to meet a boy, I'm sure she'd tell me about it, bragging that she wasn't caught and so on. But she's been doing it secretly, which is unlike her. If she was going out to meet someone for some reason tying in with our situation, it would make sense. I'll have my mother check her records."

Our conversation continued for a while (she told me a little more of what she and Kristy had said, and asked me some questions about Ashley) and when we hung up, I felt great. Even though 'the trouble may not be over yet,' I felt better than I had in weeks.

I called Emily to fill her in (about the notes and brief encounter with Kristy; about Bobbi's latest phone call; about Ashley's secret visit; and everything else I could think of that had happened in the last day-and-a-half) and we spent so much time on the phone that by the time Mom called that supper was ready, my back ached and my throat was dry.

After supper, I headed upstairs. (Mom tried to get Janine to help me with my worksheet, but she had to settle for checking it for errors when I'd told them I had finished it) and I, while waiting for her to point out the multiple mistakes I'd managed to make, pulled my CD case from the bookshelf and prepared to let _Blade_ take me into 'another world,' my current favorite song. But I never got the chance to listen to the CD I pulled out. A soft, sweet-scented cloth was suddenly wrapped over my nose and mouth from behind me, and a voice whispered into my ear from the same direction as I felt my hands being bound by something rough and thick.

"We told her not to tell anyone," the voice said, and my memory flashed to the vivid, terrified eyes of Ashley, creeping out to do what she could to help. "She listened in on private conversations and took off. We should have known not to trust her."

Just as I was about to ask the person behind the voice what they'd done with Ashley, I felt the world start to spin. My body numbed, and I felt muscles I didn't know I had relax. Then, just as the world began to blur and blacken, I felt myself moving.

And then, I didn't feel anything at all.

* * *

**Author's Note: Sorry about the bad word in Kristy's note. I don't like to use that kind of language, but it was the best word I could find to describe how Kristy might see Claudia right now.**

**As for the cliffhanger, I hope to update soon. The next chapter will be from Dahlia's POV, and I think it'll be quite interesting!**

**Thank you to everyone for reviewing! I've never had so much feedback before! :D**


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter 1****5**

**POV: Dahlia**

I hurried across my wooden bedroom floor and pushed my window open. I balanced my foot on the ledge and looked around. The moon was full, and dark, clear clouds moved across it. The bare, gnarled trees on the hill swayed in the cold breeze, and I took a deep breath as I used the foot on the windowsill to propel myself out. I fell for what felt like a full minute (but was probably really only five or ten seconds) before I managed to grip the white wooden trellis leaning against the side of the house. I felt the thorns of the roses scrape my tattered jeans, but I didn't care. I made my way to the ground and heaved a sigh, looking around the darkened yard as I rubbed at my legs to stop the tingling pain.

This wasn't the first time I'd leapt from my third-floor window and surveyed the bushes around me for a sign of life. Not that I wasn't allowed out of the house, of course. But not many seventeen-year-olds have any other choice when they have to be somewhere between midnight and six A.M., unless they have parents who are also away at those times. But my mother had been spending a lot of time at home lately, thanks to me, and it made sneaking out a little harder. In the past, I had only Bobbi, my boring, domestic twin to worry about.

I bolted and felt the familiar rush of adrenaline. I don't usually have such interesting assignments to work with, but this was special. I felt my hair whip around my face, my relaxed muscles burning under the sudden strain. It felt good, and I relaxed slightly as I allowed myself a moment to stretch. Leaping from a window thirty feet up isn't particularly good for your body, and running when you should be sleeping (if you're a baby, anyway) doesn't feel all that great either. So when I started running again, I let myself use everything I had. I felt tendons stretch. I felt muscles tense. And I felt my energy, hot from building up slowly and being restrained, begin to bubble. Everything I had worked for and sacrificed was about to be reality. Everything I'd wanted for so long was about to be mine.

There was really only one obstacle. Much like Bobbi, I work better alone. While she focuses her energy on the simple and worthless task of making sure Kerry learns the alphabet, I focus more on making sure those who hurt me pay for it. And there have been enough people in my life to make my goal of revenge a lifelong career. My father, for one. He didn't _need_ new batteries for the remote control that day he was in the accident with a cement truck that ended his life. He could have been at home, playing with his kids. Instead, he wanted to watch TV. An hour away from home turned into forever.

Bobbi couldn't care less about me. I was her twin sister, and she focused more on Kerry, who was the direct product of Mom's inability to remain loyal to a man she'd pledged herself to twenty years earlier. Mom would rather work than take care of any of us, which I also blamed on our father. It wasn't our fault he'd died, and it wasn't our fault we looked like him, reminded her of him. But she'd rather be out, working through other people's problems, than her own. So there was four people right there, in my family, who had hurt me. Kerry had, even if she didn't know it. Her very existence was a burden of work and parenthood my young sister had taken on, a burden of despair for our mother and one of humiliation to me.

Could I have helped Bobbi out more? Spoken to our mother? Been nicer to Kerry, who really couldn't help having been born? Maybe. But why should I? I was at an age where I should be out, carefree, having fun with friends. But here, despite what I say and do to and for people, I don't have many. I can't have fun without thinking I should be at home, lifting some of the curse from Bobbi. It was selfish, and I knew it. But wasn't it selfish of our father to want to go out for things we didn't need? Wasn't it selfish of our mother to go to work full-time and overtime when she had three kids at home?

I slowed down on the street I'd followed Claudia to and looked around. There was no sign of life anywhere. So I crept up to the house, used a wooden crate beside the front door to hoist myself onto the roof covering the front, ground-level porch, and edged along it. I found the window I was looking for and crouched down, peering in. Through the curtains, I could make out a vague bed shape in the darkness. It was hard to tell, with the reflection of the street illuminated in the glass, but as I stared, I could see the shape of Claudia—thin and pretty, with long, dark hair—sleeping in the bed. She rolled over twice as I watched, and I thought I could hear her mumbling. With a start, I noticed that the window was partially open. I edged away, made my way to the ground, and headed for the Wyeth house. I wasn't sure I trusted my boss, but since he'd been the one to work out how to incriminate Kristy for the poisoned dog treats (and the girl had been too depressed to think out why someone would borrow them and return them all the next day!) I knew he was at least as dangerous as necessary.

My job tonight had been to find Claudia's house and bedroom. Tomorrow night, my visit to her home would be much more interesting. But tonight's work wasn't quite finished yet. Although Bobbi had been cleared of abuse, it didn't mean I had to make life any easier for her. Our legal system may not be up to punishing those at fault, but luckily, I am.

I made my way through the gate at the side of the Wyeth house and walked for several minutes, because the house is so long, before finding my way into the backyard. The yard is like the kinds one might find in a much nicer neighborhood—a big pool, a stone terrace, a high stone wall just beyond big, flowered bushes, and enough dim light to make anyone think the sun was just setting. I hurried across the grass and into the 'shed' at the back of the yard, settling in to wait. I thought I heard the back door of the house open, but when Mr. Wyeth didn't appear, I had to wonder about it. Could it be Ashley?

I didn't move to find out. For one thing, if it was, I'd be able to ask Mr. Wyeth about it, since he was almost always on time to meet me. For another, I could hear footsteps approaching the shed, and if it wasn't who it should have been, I didn't want to be found.

But Ashley's uncle appeared at the door, a flashlight in one hand and a gun in the other, and shone the light directly at me. I resisted the urge to close my eyes and just as quickly as the light was there, brilliant and blinding me, it was gone. He pocketed the flashlight, closed the shed door behind him, and flicked the switch. The single, bare bulb dangling from the ceiling flickered to life, and the man, dressed heavily in black, took a seat on the wooden box across from me.

"Ashley just left," he informed me, before I could ask. "I think she may be going to hand out whatever she thinks she heard the other night."

"You didn't stop her?" I asked. "You didn't even use the sensitive, concerned adult routine?"

"She would see past it. She may have he head in the clouds, but she isn't an idiot. She knows she heard us talking about Claudia and the Battistas the other night." Mr. Wyeth looked annoyed. "And it makes tomorrow night's job all the more important. Are you up to it?"

"Yes, sir," I said, even though the second part of my answer was unnecessary. "But how do you know she'll be going to talk to Claudia? If she's playing hero and goes against my sister, she's going to be in more pain than she thought possible."

"Is your sister that powerful?"

"When it comes to protecting Kerry, the only thing that'll stand in her way is the thin line between absolute insanity and the last tiny thread, still hanging on," I said.

"Hmm. Well, we've been tracking Ashley for several minutes now, and if the mapped route is right, that's exactly where she's going," her uncle replied, fixing his cold, dead blue-gray eyes on me. "And if she's warning Claudia about you, the plan has worked."

"I still don't get it. I know I'm a good choice for this, but that's the problem. I'm the _perfect_ choice for this. How has there been a 'plan' to incriminate me? Aside from my own doings, which Claudia has no knowledge of, she knows almost nothing about me. She didn't even know I existed, quite literally, until that night Mom took us both down to the police station to clear up the 'abuse' thing, and even then, it was mostly a ploy so Claudia would believe Bobbi really did have a family."

"That's just it, Dahlia. You _are_ the perfect choice for this. Your natural naïveté and expertise with weaponry are unmatched by most your age. Your ability to pass yourself off as someone else, especially with the sophistication you have, is immense. Like Ashley, you're an unknown pawn in this game. Even _you_ can't begin to understand it all. Ashley has no idea that everything she thinks she's doing on her own is exactly what was necessary for all of this to work. We knew she'd trust herself to do what was right, even though we're using that to our advantage. So it's important that you _don't_ understand it all. In fact, just doing what you have been, out on missions with no questions asked, is perfect. And tomorrow, things will be even better."

Mr. Wyeth hesitated, as though unsure of what to say next. I wasn't fooled. He knew what to say. He knew what had to be done. And he knew how to get people to do what was necessary for his benefit. He didn't even need the gun. He knew how to manipulate people perfectly, without them even knowing it. I supposed some of it was inherited. His dead brother, my father, was the same way. It was how I'd managed to convince Ashley that I was a friend, and that something strange was going on. It was weird to incriminate myself to her, but it was necessary. Letting her slowly see subtle signs, letting her begin to doubt my sanity, was necessary, too, even if the process was so slow (for the sake of realism) that I thought I was _actually_ losing my sanity.

"You do remember the plan, don't you?" My. Wyeth's eyes has stopped their perpetual wandering and were now back on mine, flickering with doubt. I hated his eyes. It was like his eyes mocked everything; his existence, mine, and everything else.

"Yes. I kidnap Claudia, and bring her to you. Ashley is there, tied up. She's on our side, but doesn't know it yet," I guessed, and Mr. Wyeth nodded. "Ashley is safe, but her struggling will benefit us both. It'll look real to Claudia, keep Ashley out of the way, and keep you and I from having to trust other defects."

He nodded. "Yes, that was quite unfortunate. I was sure the Schafer girl would be perfect for the job. It was too bad she decided she was working on both sides."

"Traitor," I agreed, knowing that sparkling look in his eyes. It was like an evil gleam, a fierce hatred of being opposed. "Double-agent."

Mr. Wyeth nodded, and I wondered if he'd killed the Schafer girl. He'd never said, but it was like him not to. Like an unspoken threat. The fear of the unknown would be enough to keep his minions, random recruits like me, from turning on him. I wasn't even sure how I'd managed to meet him, or how I'm ended up working for him. All I was really sure of now was that I did, and that if I didn't, I'd probably end up 'like that Schafer girl.' And even if I wasn't sure I believed in Mr. Wyeth's cause, whatever it was, I knew that I didn't want to believe in any other way of getting what I wanted. Only a fool would turn from help like his, especially at the expense it would cost you. Whatever the former assistant to Mr. Wyeth's scheme had done, I knew not to do it, or anything like it. So I was often sneaking out on overnight jobs, checking on people and sometimes, kidnapping them. But this was the first time something so close, involving my family, had to be done.

It was why Mr. W's plan was so odd. I did want revenge. Revenge on life (revenge on death, too) itself. So why would I incriminate myself to anyone? Had I been lying about myself to Ashley, it would have been more like the mysteries and moral/legal battles on TV. But this was confusing. I was telling the truth to Ashley, who believed me, of course. I would be in real trouble either way. Truth or not.

It was confusing.

"So, here are the details. Claudia's family eats around six P.M.," Mr. Wyeth said, standing up and cracking his knuckles. "Within fifteen minutes, there's a seventy-five percent chance that she'll return to her room. You, already inside, drug her to make her easier for transporting. Make sure she understands that Ashley was involved. When she passes out, inform me immediately. We'll have others over to help. Meanwhile, stay out of sight. The undeserved _C_ she got on that report should be enough to keep her parents downstairs, talking or arguing as usual, but they may ask that sister of hers to help. Stay out of sight and meet me at our usual place, eight P.M., and be sure to dress well. It'll be cold up there."

I nodded. "Okay. Got it."

"Get some sleep," he added. "You won't get much tomorrow night."

* * *

I shivered in anticipation as I walked home. There was no need to run or rush; nobody would be waiting for me. Nobody ever did. If someone was, it would be a surprise. Probably, if anyone did, it would be Mom, eager to jump into her disciplinary 'Mom' role after several years of not even caring enough to come home on time, even for birthdays. But none of that would matter. I didn't need anyone but Mr. Wyeth. He took care of me. He was there for me. And, tomorrow night, we would be there for each other in a new way. My dream of victory, my long-awaited vengeance, was finally about to be a reality.

As I neared the house, I sighed. The kitchen light was on. I walked in and turned, closing the door and kicking off my boots, and shrugging out of my coat, all at once.

"Where were you?"

I closed my eyes in impatience. Of all the times I'd snuck out, why this time? Why, when things were about to get good, did she bother?

"What do you care?" I responded.

"Of course I care!" Bobbi replied. She looked as annoyed as I felt, and somewhat pretty in a long, pink silk nightgown. "You know, its one thing to mess up your own life, but another entirely to mess up mine. I shouldn't have to wait up for you every night!"

It was news to me that she ever did. "Then why do you?"

"Because I care. But maybe I shouldn't," Bobbi replied, and turned around. As she left, she flicked the lightswitch off and left me in the darkness of the kitchen.

"Fine," I muttered, but I followed her. I didn't have much of a choice, since all of the bedrooms are on the third floor.

"Besides, you don't need me to mess up your life," I added. "It's already messed up."

"All thanks to you," Bobbi snapped, and before I could say anything, she closed the bedroom door behind her.

That surprised me. Not that she'd closed the door on me, since it wasn't the first time she'd been mad enough at me to do so, but that she'd admitted her life wasn't perfect. It was weird to hear, since I'd always assumed she thought her life was perfect. She spoke like Mom, which I assumed she did because she, unlike me, graduated from high school.

So I went to bed, hoping we hadn't woken anyone else with our argument (though it was certainly one of the more mild ones, probably because it was the middle of the night) and fell asleep quickly. I was suddenly really looking forward to the next day.

* * *

I decided to spend Tuesday preparing myself for the night's work. Not many girls ever have to abduct someone else, especially someone as young as Claudia, but that was part of what made our situation so unique. In any case, I knew I'd need to prepare.

For one thing, I couldn't go looking like myself. So, after Bobbi had taken her morning shower, I went in and cleaned myself up. (Despite how I look, I do shower quite often.) When I came out, I headed back to my room to finish up. I couldn't go unarmed, and I couldn't go in ratty sneakers. Luckily, I had gotten myself the perfect outfit for the occasion: a skintight black leotard; tight black leather boots, with heels; and a long, black coat to go over my leotard. But since I wouldn't need the outfit until later, I decided to work instead with my hair. Unlike Bobbi's, which is straight, mine is wavy and kind of fluffy. I usually hate the way it looks, all feminine and maintained, but because I usually grease it to fit in with my 'designer grunge' look, as Bobbi called it. But because I'd just washed it, it looked too nice. So I pulled it back with a black headband, and went to work on my makeup. When I'd pulled on a shiny, black, one-shoulder tank-top and dark blue jeans and inspected myself, I decided I needed my best boots—tan leather cowgirl-style boots with heels—to go with it. I rummaged through my closet, found them, and whirled around as a knock on my door startled me into an upright position.

Mom entered, and I expected her to lecture me about sneaking out overnight. If Bobbi's argument hadn't woken her, Bobbi must have told her. But she brought me a small bag of vitamins from the pharmacy (ever since Dad died, she's worried everyone else around her will drop dead any time) and left, without comment.

_Bobbi's either decided it's time to cut me some slack, or she has something of her own to hide,_ I thought. _That, or she really doesn't care._

I spent the whole day avoiding everyone, as usual. It's not unusual for me to either spend the whole day in my room or go out. So, after a day of adding weapons to my clothes, under my jacket but strapped into sheaths attached to the waist of my leotard (I had to attach them myself, of course) and listening to music in my room (and snacking, since I have plenty of snacks hidden in my closet) and napping, I was more than ready to do what I'd been told to do. Not that I wouldn't have done it without being told to, although it helped to have someone making the decisions for me.

_Pretty soon, people will be thinking more about me than about Bobbi_, I thought. I knew I'd wanted Bobbi to take the spotlight when I accused her of child abuse (and using Claudia's name was, unfortunately, not even my own idea) but I'd changed my mind.

Luckily, soon things would be going my way. As strange as it might seem to some, I love causing controversy.

I reached Claudia's house in record time. I managed to reach her bedroom window just as she was leaving, and as quietly as I could, I waited several minutes and opened her window. I slipped inside noiselessly, and waited just inside her open closet door. I knew I didn't have to worry about too much; I was armed. But while I waited, I poured the solution Mr. Wyeth had given me from the clear, slender glass vial onto the pale blue cloth he'd told me to use. I waved it lightly to dry it, and fifteen or so minutes later, I heard footsteps approaching the door from the hall.

_Get ready._

Claudia opened her door and stepped inside, in plain view. She flicked the light on, closed the door, and headed for the stereo. Just as she pulled a CD from the case, I leapt forward. Luckily, her room was carpeted. I wrapped the cloth around her face, and while she absorbed the shock (and the mild poison) I bound her hands. She was breathing hard from the shock of my actions, and I knew it would only increase the speed and effect of the drug.

I told her about Ashley, as Mr. Wyeth had told me to. I knew Claudia would want to ask about the girl. There was so much she didn't know yet.

There was so much I didn't know yet.

As Claudia tried to form a question, I felt her relax as I finished tying her hands together. She'd inhaled to try and form the words. I could feel her balance failing, and I caught her as she slipped from one realm of consciousness to the other. I propped her against her closet door (closed now) in an upright heap on the floor and waited.

Claudia's eyes had closed, her muscles relaxed. She wouldn't fight.

As promised, help arrived. I couldn't tell who they were (or whether or not they were my age or older, or male or female) but they were strong. They each picked one end of Claudia off the floor, and without being seen (the sun had set, but the streetlights were coming on) carried her out the window, off the roof, and to a waiting van.

I had done my job. I should have felt good. But I didn't, and it was a pretty rotten end to something I'd looked forward to. Maybe because Claudia wasn't my true goal. She was just one of the milestone pawns in the game.

At least I had yet to meet with Wyeth. That, at least, would be somewhat entertaining.

Seeing the terrified look on Ashley's face, and the hatred and fear for her friends on Claudia's, would make things worth it. This would be fun. I've read up on torture, and although this would be some of the mildest, it would be entertaining. We knew so much about Claudia (we even knew her parents were fighting, something she herself didn't know!) that I hoped I'd have the chance to speak to her tonight personally. To think she thought her parents were simply working more now that she was older was almost funny.

And maybe Mr. Wyeth would be proud. Proud of me, I mean. I'd never had anyone proud of me, not since my father.

I could hardly wait until eight o'clock.

* * *

**Author's Note: Here it is, the first Dahlia chapter! There may be another, but I fear this story is dragging on a little now. In any case, there should be at least one more, and I think there might be more than that, since I feel there are still 'loose ends.'**

**In any case, I'm wondering why Dahlia is so eager for eight…clearly, Mr. Wyeth is the kind of guy who might have other intentions for her; poor girl. I just had to bring Dawn into this somehow…and explain some of the weird parts of my story, though Dahlia seems a little insane. Anyway, please review if you like/don't like it!**


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16**

I was quite confused when I woke up, but for the strangest reason, I felt like I should hide both the fact that I was confused _and_ that I was awake. The funny thing was, I was confused because when I wake up, I can almost always smell pancakes, toast, or coffee.

But I opened my eyes as little as I could and had to squint. It wasn't the bright sunlight I was accustomed to seeping through my curtains; it was glaring, flickering fluorescent lights about six feet above my head. It was hot in…

Where was I? I was stiff and sore, so obviously I'd been here, wherever 'here' was, for quite some time. I tried to move, but I realized, with a metallic clanking sound, that I couldn't. It took only seconds to realize I was chained up. My hands were chained together, which were chained to the chains around my ankles. Those chains were connected to the thicker chain around my waist, and another set of chains looping up my chest and back were connected to what I could only assume was a metal collar, cold and thick but not tight, around my neck. Another piece of metal (I think) was behind my head, and as if the chains mashing into legs and spine bones as I tried to move (not that I could get more than a few millimeters without pain too intense for me to keep moving against) wasn't bad enough, I was chained to the wall behind me. The walls to my left and right, as well as behind me (it felt like metal, anyway, though I couldn't turn around to check) were also metal, and the roof over my head matched the floor, dull and gray but slightly shiny, which, by the feel of it, was also metal.

Directly in front of me, maybe two feet ahead of the feet, my feet, that I couldn't move, were thick steel bars. They were probably an inch around, with three inches between them. I was in a cage.

A very strange cage. The gray walls on each side of me didn't reach the bars. And the roof overhead, although low and gray, was slightly clear. The lights were actually beyond it, on a high roof, but the metal was so odd that it seemed to magnify and strengthen the light. Blinded as I was, it took several minutes for me to make sense of anything beyond the gray. Vague shapes formed slowly beyond it, like I was seeing a dense, dirty white fog evaporate as I neared it, revealing what had before been invisible behind it.

I could tell that the bars weren't just in front of me. A row of steel bars extended for ten or fifteen feet on each side of my cage, and just beyond my wall, I could make out a silky silhouette trying to get comfortable. It looked like me, but when I saw it, I froze. And it kept moving. My first thought was that it was the wall, holographic like the display projectors they use in school, but it looked too close, too vague. Too human.

Wherever I was, I wasn't alone. A quick (and painful) look around told me that there were cages almost everywhere around me. I hadn't seen past my bars at first, but now, I knew I had to look. And even straight ahead, rows of cages that I assumed mirrored my own were filled with people. I couldn't recognize any of them. I couldn't even tell if any of them were alive. Hair fell across the slumped bodies, chained to their own cages. They were all chained in the same way, and the way I'd been chained was no different. I leaned forward, straining against my metallic captors, and looked up. Cages of people were piled higher than my eyes were able to see. Looking up, I couldn't tell if anyone was above me. Or below me. With a start, I realized that just beyond the bars was empty space, above and below me. The gray platform I was on (and chained to; I hadn't even noticed at first that I was chained to the floor as well as to the wall) didn't even reach the bars.

How long of a drop was there between me and the floor? If all of the platforms fell, would the prisoners inadvertently crush each other?

It took a moment for me to focus again. Staring at the people across from me had literally taken the breath out of me. It had felt like I assumed Mallory had when she fell off a horse. (She'd told us how it felt, and it was how I felt now.) It hurt. And when I was able to see, I was dimly aware of a shape moving down between the rows of cages.

Someone, a man I didn't know, peered into my cage. I assumed I was only one cage above the floor, so there was probably someone below me. Unless the head looking me over now was attached to someone standing on a ladder, which seemed entirely possible in this place.

"Well, look who's awake," the man said, sounding cheerful and not at all responsible for my being here, and I heard him fiddling with something that clanked and sounded crinkly, a little like a Twinkie wrapper as someone opens it. "Are you hungry?"

I tried to reply, but I realized then (how had I not noticed sooner?) that my mouth was covered in something. Something soft, something…tight. Restraining. I couldn't speak.

The man was clearly not here to save me. He opened what must have been a huge door in the bars (I couldn't tell; all I saw was the bars ahead of me swing open like a door) and sat himself down at the edge of my platform. Turning, he checked my chains, tightened the looser ones around my upper half, and marked something on a clipboard. He left as quickly as he had gone, and I heard other doors opening in the room around me. I heard chains rattling, doors closing, and the process repeating itself, echoing. The room seemed bare; no windows or doors—and I couldn't help but wonder if I was going to die.

But why was I here? Who wanted me? Why?

The answers were far fewer than my questions, and I ended up opting for closing my eyes (it wasn't like keeping them open was doing me much good, aside from blinding me and giving me the occasional glimpse of life) and pretending to sleep. Undoubtedly, whoever managed to bring me here wanted something from me, and maybe, if I pretended to be asleep, they would wait.

I doubted they would be nice either way. Not many people would drag a fourteen-year-old girl out of her bedroom early in the evening and cage her in some unknown place. Especially an unknown place where it looked like nobody ever left once they were here.

I examined some of the other occupants of surrounding cages when the clanking noises stopped and the heavy banging of a metal door closing followed the only sound of footsteps. Then, the sound of the same door locking echoed dully in the room. None of the other prisoners looked as content as I was, which said a lot. With the lights a little more dim, I peered as far out as I could and ignored as much of the sharp, prickling pain as I could.

One of the girls almost directly across from me looked like she was dying. She wasn't moving much, but one of her skeletal hands scratched at the other weakly. Her thin hair hung in limp, stringy clumps, and looked like it hadn't been washed in days. Her skin was frighteningly pale, and her closed eyes gave her the ghostlike appearance local Stoneybrook rock groups (teenagers in garages who'd managed to gain some fame) aimed for. She was thin and dressed in a threadbare brown cloak, which enveloped her tiny frame like storm clouds around the top of a mountain. She looked slightly older than me, but it was hard to tell. Her lips and cheeks had no color, and like the rest of her, appeared frail and hollow. If she had eaten recently, it was probably the red marking her face and arms, which were almost all of what I could see of her skin in the shadow. Or maybe it was blood. It was hard to tell from this distance, but if she noticed them, she didn't care.

I was cold. I'd never been this cold before. I felt like a piece of ice. I was actually beyond shivering—that's how cold I was. Instead, I felt a tingling pain in everything below my neck, like I was being stabbed with needles. And, deeper than that, was a different pain accompanied by a chilling numbness. Was this death? How long did frostbite take? I felt myself shudder, but it was a weak, involuntary movement. With a start (this one from surprise more than anything) I realized I'd been crying. I felt one of the tears slip down my face, and felt a little better knowing my tears hadn't frozen yet. Maybe there was hope. If water weren't freezing, I wouldn't die. But I wasn't sure of that; science had never been my best (or my favorite) subject in school. I knew enough to pass (barely) but not enough to judge how long I might last here.

_Maybe someone will come talk to me,_ I thought. _Why else would they bring me here? They must have had a reason._

As though my thoughts had summoned someone, I heard a door open. Footsteps approached. As I closed my eyes, I took one last look at the others. Nobody else appeared awake, and I didn't want to be the one in the spotlight. But the footsteps grew louder until they echoed, and it sounded like they stopped right in front of me. I wanted to check, but I didn't dare open my eyes. I strained to remain as still as passive as I could, but it wasn't easy, especially as the sound of a lock being opened was uncomfortably close.

"Kishi?"

I flinched and rolled my head to face the door as I opened my eyes, as though I'd been almost-asleep. (I pulled the same trick on my mother several times when school was still unbearable for me.) I assume the person, another man, standing in front of me bought the trick, because he waited a moment, as if to allow me time to wake up before he asked anything of me.

"Someone will be in soon to talk to you," the man said, looking me over. He looked confused, probably wondering why I looked so fresh from the outside world. After all, I didn't look starved or deprived of sleep and sunlight. "You may want to prepare your answers."

Before I said anything (not that I could) he removed the imposing cloth from my mouth. As I cleared my throat and tried to form a word, it was lost in the tremendous noise of the door closing and locking again. Footsteps hurried away, and I heard the door close with another bang. At the same time, a door to my right opened (so far, both men I'd seen had gone to the left, so I assumed there were at least two doors leading into the room) and I heard much heavier footsteps approach.

This time, I knew right away that the person coming was coming for me. And, as strange as it probably sounds, even the air felt different with this person around. Commanding, intrusive—and powerful. Dark, even, as though I could sense the person's intentions. I wasn't surprised when another man appeared, facing me, but I was surprised to see that he didn't look evil. He looked old, actually. Almost the age of Russ, my uncle. Maybe even my father's age, although my father was two years younger than my uncle.

And despite that, there was still something I could feel about him that I didn't trust.

Unlike the prisoners, his eyes weren't sunken. But like the appearance of his captives, he looked dead. Alive, but dead. Without a soul, without a conscience, without a care for life and morals.

"Claudia Kishi," he said, sounding thoughtful, as though my name meant much more to him than it should. Despite having my mouth free to use, I didn't respond. He didn't look like he wanted a response, even though what he'd said hadn't exactly been rhetorical.

He gestured to me, though he was alone, and I looked around. I didn't see at first what he found so fascinating about the area around me, but as I focused in on the shape moving more frantically on the wall, I noticed that the wall itself was moving slowly, into a thin space in the wall behind me. The wall on my left wasn't moving, but the shape I'd seen 'on' the wall to my right earlier was actually someone behind the wall, in a cage cubicle just like mine.

I saw the sneakers first, drawn up to the person's chest, just like mine. I felt helpless, but the person beside me must have felt worse. She certainly looked worse. Ashley Wyeth's face was scarred with jagged scrapes, bloodied and bruised. Her arms, so tightly gripped in the chains that they were pale and puffy, were skinny and bruised. And not with a bruise here and there, but bruised so that they were purple from her red-stained white T-shirt sleeves to her slender hands, grasping at the legs of her jeans in a grip so tight her frigid fingers had turned white. Her nails looked broken, her hands battered, her face beaten. I noticed the slightest rise and fall of her chest, accompanied by only the soft, watery rasp of her labored breaths. She was alive. Barely.

"She's been here only a day," the man said, his voice flat and old. "Think of what you'll feel like when you've been here a hundred times as long."

I shuddered, again involuntarily, but the man smiled at me, slowly undoing the lock of the door. Ashley stirred weakly in her plaintive slumber, but didn't seem conscious.

I wish I could say I resisted as the man freed me from the wall and gripped the end of the chains, but I couldn't. Frozen with the cold and numb with fear, I realized as he started dragging me down the narrow corridor between cages that I was more helpless than I'd thought. The prolonged position I'd been in had made me stiff, and the pain from the chains digging slowly into my flesh had caused small cuts, which were bleeding.

And, although it horrified me to see, it looked like the blood was already drying. It was either drying or freezing, and at that point, I was too nervous about what this man would do when we were in further seclusion to me to care.

I expected sexual abuse. Ashley looked like she might have already sustained some, but because the blood splattered in small droplets in some areas and bigger places in others on her clothing was everywhere on her, it was hard to tell.

But the man, whoever he was, wasn't interested in further abusing anyone physically. When Dahlia Battista stepped into the room (and despite having seen Ashley and pondered her warning about Dahlia, I was surprised to see her) I knew this would be a much different kind of torture. And although my suspicions for the family had lessened, they now rushed back in full force. Was Bobbi behind this? Had she really believed me, or had she decided to get rid of me just in case?

"Hello, Claudia," Dahlia said, in a voice too cool and steely to be human.

I didn't answer. The man, who had still been holding me, dropped me in an ungraceful heap to the floor. I felt my chin hit the cold, hard floor with the force of a basketball to the face, and cringed as the cracking sound reminded me of bones snapping. I'd heard the sound in a movie once, and wondered if shock or cold had dulled the pain of a broken jaw. The man pressed several buttons into an electronic pad beside the door, which slid open and closed behind him as he left. Dahlia seated herself in a chair nearby. Although I was in what felt like a laboratory, with steel counters along a white wall and scientific charts along the wall, the other half of the room looked a little like the Battista library. Warm and inviting, with a blazing fireplace, and books on almost every surface.

"Let's begin, shall we?"

* * *

I don't know how long I'd been there. I don't remember all of what Dahlia said. What I did remember was a dull, stiff ache settling in over me. Mixing with my uncomfortable position on the floor (and trying to keep an eye on Dahlia didn't help anything, since she was seated behind me and I didn't trust her there more than I'd trust Alan Gray) and the bitter chill despite the fire, I felt terrible. And Dahlia didn't care. She was enjoying this.

"…And to think your parents would have simply taken on more work because you've gotten older is ridiculous," Dahlia said, cackling a little like a Halloween witch might. "They've been fighting for seven months, you idiot! How can you not know?" (This was, although not great, not the worst of the things she'd said to me over the last hour or so. It had been at least an hour, and Dahlia had never ceased to lose awful things to say.)

Dahlia said, sounding pleased, that the man had raped Ashley. She had said Emily was next, that she would be brought here and see me in the cage beside her, just as I'd seen Ashley, and that because she'd been involved and silent the whole time, it would be worse. And she said other things I don't ever want to repeat.

"How can you sound proud of what you've done?" I croaked, and in response, I only got the same manic cackle.

"How can _you_ be proud of what you've done?" was the reply. "You intruded. And as you know by now, nothing of any value comes without a cost. You wanted knowledge? You want to know things that aren't your business? You want to be involved with us? This is what you get, Claudia. This is where you pay for what you bought."

She showed me video evidence of what had been done to Ashley. And, although I thought I had a strong stomach, I gagged almost the whole time. I wanted to look away, to purge it from my mind, from reality—and I couldn't. I was helpless. I saw what they wanted me to see. I believed what they wanted me to believe.

"And soon," Dahlia said, as if she'd read my thoughts, "you will think like we think. It's inevitable. But it's not punishment, Claudia. It's your reward."

* * *

**Author's Note: Here it is…does anyone out there think I should put a warning on the last chapter or two? It **_**is**_** rated 'T,' but because people sometimes don't pay attention to those or don't think they'll care (or, some of them just like to complain) I'm just wondering. Anyway, please review with what you think! :D**

**(Next chapter or two, since this isn't done yet, may be similar. Here's the warning, a little early and without feedback, just in case.) This one felt lame to me...**


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17**

It's almost funny that in times of crisis and need, we sometimes think about the things that are the least important. When Dawn and I were stranded on an island, all Dawn could think about—or so she said, anyway—was the time. And it was one of the things I kept wondering about, too. It felt like days had passed, but what if it had only been a few hours? And why should it matter? Knowing whether or not it was still Monday night wouldn't help me.

Life had become simple: there was no food; there was no water; there was no freedom. I couldn't get up and use a bathroom, or wash my hands. Or my hair. I couldn't move. I couldn't eat or drink or sleep. Sleep should have been easy, since there wasn't much to do. But there was plenty to see and hear, and when I finally did manage to fall asleep—or pass out from exhaustion; I wasn't sure which—someone or something woke me. Usually, it was someone walking down the aisle, banging something on the metal bars fronting the cages. Sometimes, it was panic. But, and although the least common, the most horrifying thing that woke me and kept me in an involuntary vigil, was the screaming.

I wasn't sure what was being done to cause the screaming, but I could guess. And although I wasn't positive, I didn't want to be. I'd seen enough already. I felt like I was starving, although I could tell that I wasn't. For one thing, a lot of the other people in the cages around me were far worse off. Some weren't ever fed, while others were given pills and then forced to eat. I knew pills could be made to keep a person from throwing up, and the pain those people seemed to be in was agonizing, even to me. I figured out that some of the prisoners were forced to take drugs (illegal ones, by the sounds of it) and when addicted, they were deprived to keep the torture session lively for the people running the place—whatever it was.

And, through all of that, was the incessant hunger, the pain of being chained up all the time. The metal was cold and hard. The air was cold. My numbed body had stopped shivering. I'd read enough about hypothermia to know that two of the most easily recognized symptoms were shallow, irregular breaths and when the person is too cold to shiver anymore. And although this was bad, it was nothing compared to what I could see. And that was another torture: we could all see each other and relate, but there was nothing we could do to help. At least they hadn't yet thrown a bucket of freezing water on me. They had done it to a girl already today…or tonight, whatever it was…and her skin was now a frightening shade of green-gray. She looked like she was dying.

And although I felt pretty alone, the wall between Ashley and I hadn't been pushed back to its original spot. I could still see her when she was returned to her cage each time, and although we couldn't talk (they kept the metal muzzles on each of us all the time) I felt a little better knowing she was there, even if it was also selfish because I shouldn't want anyone else to experience what I was feeling.

One of the other things I did, simply because I could (and because looking around while awake, which was often, was depressing) was think. Mostly about Stacey, which felt odd because while I should have been thinking about how to survive, all I could think about was Stacey. I hadn't understood her reasons when she left the BSC, but now that I was older, I felt like I did. Even back then, she'd been too mature. But compared to a lot of things, my life had been so superficial and frivolous and planned. It had all been so pointless. _This_, what I was feeling now, was _real._ Too real.

After looking around quickly, making sure I hadn't been dreaming (and since nobody was running around, calling, "Where's my sweater?" or "Hey, the coffee is ready!" I knew I hadn't. So I leaned my head back to relax as much as I could and felt a twinge of pain in my neck. I leaned forward and scratched the itch, but I felt my fingernails catch on something delicate. My spine?

No. This was cold and almost grainy.

_My necklace._ I'd gotten Mimi a pink coral necklace when my friends and I had gone on a vacation to the Bahamas, and when she died, I'd found it in her jewelry box with my name on it. A lot of her things had been labeled with our names. And I'd been wearing it ever since.

"Claudia?"

Startled, I craned my neck to the right. Ashley's eyes had fluttered open, and she was watching me. Although she was my age, she looked much older. Older, and exhausted.

"How are you?" I asked, speaking in a voice barely audible even to me, but Ashley closed her eyes and shook her head, unable to speak. I saw her swallow, but a tear slipped down her cheek. She simply opened her eyes and watched me again, and the look of despair, like she'd given up, haunted me. Her eyes said all that needed to be said. It was like a silent understanding; one beyond middle school friend feuds and baby-sitting clubs and art classes. It was about survival. Nothing more.

We felt the same pain, in a way. We were both hungry. But I hadn't been hurt, like she had. And the look in her eyes, as evident as the bruises on her body, said more than enough. But she shook her head again, and that was as far as communication went.

I think I fell asleep again after that, because when I woke up next, I was in a small room. What woke me up wasn't a clanging metal, nor was it the intense hunger and thirst I'd been feeling for who knew how long.

What woke me up was the strangest, and most welcome, feeling of peace. I was sure I had died, succumbed to the cold or hunger or both. Because when I woke up, I felt not only well-rested and warm, but full and relaxed. I wasn't in any pain, and I was lying almost flat, my upper body raised slightly, on a cushy lawn chair instead of a cold, hard metal floor.

I wanted to stand up, to look around—but I didn't. For one thing, although I felt a lot better, I wasn't sure I _could_ walk. I didn't feel strong enough to move. It was like when a doctor gives you drugs before surgery to put you to sleep. I felt a little disorientated, but mostly, just weak enough to keep me from moving. It was either that I'd been drugged or was finally too relaxed to want to move.

"You're awake," a new voice said, but the tone wasn't laced with menace or malice. It sounded conversational, almost neutral—like a narrator observing the events of a play, my life, without emotion.

I turned. I could move a little, at least.

Another girl was lying beside me, two feet away on a chair exactly like the one I assumed I was in. Although she didn't sound threatening, she looked pretty intimidating. She could have been an older me, but I couldn't tell how old she was. Like me, she was Japanese. Unlike me, she had gorgeous black hair that hung to her shoulders in silky waves. Her eyes were big and dark, framed by equally stunning lashes, and her skin was almost flawless aside from several scars that only seemed to add to the mysterious beauty of the girl. She was wearing an orange jumpsuit with white stripes on the arms, sides, and legs, and was strapped into her chair. Looking down, I could see that I wasn't strapped in or restricted at all.

She and I were alone in the room.

Immediately, I was sure this was a trap. I once read a story where a boy is tortured, but because he doesn't understand pleasure or happiness, pain doesn't affect him. So, to make the pain worse, they first allow him to experience some of the best in life. Then, far too soon, they send him back to the torture chamber and the pain is so intense because he finally understands the opposite that it kills him. It had been a story I hated, because in my mind, all stories had happy endings.

I'd changed my mind about that. This desperate situation felt pretty hopeless.

"This isn't a trap," the girl said, as if she'd read my mind. "This is just another form of torture. Deprive us of everything people deem necessary, give us a little, then take it all away to make it hurt even worse. These people seem to know what they're doing."

I stared at her. She spoke neutrally, like what was happening was something she was watching in a movie. Did she know it was real?

Did _I_ know it was real?

Was it?

"I'm not crazy," the girl replied. "I know I don't sound like someone who has been locked up here for a long time. But I have. And because I knew this day was coming, I knew enough to pretend to fit in here and help you. You are the only hope we have."

"What…why me?" Her words sounded rehearsed, almost clichéd.

"You have been closer to the outside world recently than anyone else in here," the girl replied, "aside from the people keeping us here."

"Do you know what they want from us? Do you know who they are?" Even if this was a trap, even if it was all planned out, and even if this girl worked for the people keeping us here, I needed answers. And this girl seemed like someone who could provide them.

She struggled to sit up suddenly, and coughed. It was a weak cough, dry and almost sick. But just as suddenly as she'd convulsed, she relaxed and turned towards me again. I found myself wondering about her less and feeling more like she and I were allies.

"Mr. Wyeth runs this compound," the girl said, and I saw her fists clench in the shackles that kept her still. "This compound is just like a medieval fortress. There are guards, traps, and security devices everywhere. There is almost no chance of escape. It's why I've been here so long. Mr. Wyeth took me from my home when I was six months old. I've been raised here. I've never been away from here. I've been told since I was old enough to understand that my purpose in life was here. But through prisoners like you, I learned of a very different world beyond the walls." She stopped to cough again.

"You've been here your whole life?" I asked, wondering how long that had been. "How did you survive?"

"I wasn't in the cages, like you were," the girl said. "Unless I misbehaved, of course. I was a slave for a long time, and when I was a little older, a concubine." Her voice lost the emotionless neutrality and took on a tone of intense anger and shame. "They killed my family. I was forced to watch, to help them. I want them _dead_!" Her voice had been normal, but it became a growl, a throaty threat punctuated by another coughing spell. She sounded awful.

"Have you tried to escape?" I couldn't help asking.

"Just once. It's the reason I never tried again," she added, indicating her metal restrains and glancing pointedly at me. "The Wyeth man never believed in bad deeds without punishment."

I wasn't sure I wanted to know what 'punishment' meant in this place, and the girl didn't explain. Instead, she simply leaned back.

"Can I count on you?" the girl asked. "You aren't restrained. You could free us."

_If I do, and I'm caught, I won't have another chance. But if I don't…_

"I'll help," I said, and the girl's face, studying mine during my short, silent debate, broke into a ghost of a smile.

"In that case, could you free me? I've had an itch on the back of my head forever."

_I hope I'm not freeing one of the people working against me,_ I thought, pushing myself to the edge of the chair and using it against the backs of my legs to balance myself as I stood up. To my surprise, I could stand—barely. I almost collapsed into the chair, but I forced myself to remain upright. I felt my legs twitching, like a seizure, but any worry I should have felt over that was replaced first by a sense of achievement, then, panic. Footsteps beyond the door made my heart chill to a stop, and I rushed to the girl. I don't know how I got the restrains open, or when. The next thing I knew, the girl had dragged me into a closet and locked us in. Through tiny slits, we saw three armed men burst in, survey our chairs, and radio for backup.

The girl's hand squeezed mine tightly, and I felt myself squeezing back. I didn't know this girl, not even her _name_, and yet, I felt comforted.

I think I blacked out. The sudden movement, the dark warmth and lack of pain and hunger, had weakened me. I don't know why, since they were all things I needed. But when I was next aware of my surroundings, someone was quenching my thirst and I had a pebble between my toes.

I squirmed a little, uncomfortably hot.

_Now I'm dead,_ I thought._ This must be hell._

But it wasn't. I opened my eyes and saw fire, but because I could see the girl leaning over me, supporting my head with one hand and holding a canteen of cold water to my lips, I knew I wasn't dead.

"We're out," the girl said. Vaguely, I smelled smoke. Her clothes looked burned.

That was the last thing I remembered. I think I remembered her leaving, saying something about firewood, but when I was next sure enough that I was awake, I was awake because of screams.

I ran from the cave (it was the first time I'd realized where we were) and found the girl in the midst of battle. Her fists and feet flew, but one girl wasn't much of a match against five armed men. One hit her with the end of his gun, and another punched her so hard while she was falling from the first blow I was sure they'd killed her.

Before I was sure of anything, the men were gone and the girl remained on the ground, her body twisted so that she was lying mostly on her side, her arms over her head protectively, facedown on the cold dirt strewn with dried pine needles.

I rushed to the girl's side and tried, as gently as I could, to uncover her face. She curled into a ball, but let me move her arms. Her face was bloody, but she sputtered weakly and tried to sit up. More blood dripped from her mouth and down her chin, but she didn't seem aware of it. She collapsed back onto the ground and sighed, an exertion that caused a thin spray of blood. She lay there for a moment, heaving, eyes unfocused, skin pale. At least her skin wasn't as bad as some of the skin I'd seen on the other prisoners—pulled over their bones like tracing paper over pencils.

"Claudia," she said, and I had to lean down in the dirt to hear the rest. "Make your freedom worthwhile, okay?"

"Should I…rescue the others?" I wondered, even though the moment didn't really call for me asking a question. What she'd said should have been enough. It would have, in a movie, been a good time for some sad music and thoughtful silence from the characters. But this wasn't a movie, and nobody was playing a part here.

"No. They've been rescued," the girl said, even though I was sure she'd died. Her pupils had dilated, her eyes barely able to remain open. She blinked up at me.

"What?"

"I didn't spend all of my time in there just sitting around and being someone's toy," she said, her voice even weaker now. "I learned how to construct bombs."

"W-what?" I asked, stuttering though the word was simple and I'd heard her perfectly.

"Believe me, Claudia, it was the only way to free them. I should know. The only freedom we could give them was death, and I wasn't going to escape without freeing them, too."

I felt sick. But, despite that, I understood. Maybe the only way to free them was through death. And even so, Dahlia's words echoed through my mind as the girl lying in the dirt beside me clutched my hand with the last strength in her body. Maybe I _was_ becoming just like them. Seeing so much death as freedom was certainly morbid, so how could I be seeing it as _freedom?_

The girl died. She actually _died_. Nobody had ever died like that before, right next to me and without any help. Although she was a victim and a killer, I could see her only as a hero of sorts. When I managed to remove my hand from hers, I covered my face and burst into tears. I never imagined my life would come to this—lost in a forest, crying, feeling helpless, and sitting next the corpse that had risked it all to save my life. And I didn't even know the girl's name.

When I stopped crying, mostly because I felt more helpless and vulnerable than ever, I pulled several flowers from their spot in the ground and placed them over the girl's body. I felt it was the least I could do. It felt right, somehow. Then, I got up and ran. I didn't even pay attention to where I was going. It wouldn't have done me any good. It wasn't like I knew where I was.

I collapsed into the rocky sand around a small river some time later, having realized that darkness had fallen and that not only were my ribs cramping, but that I was thirsty, exhausted, and in need of a rest. I drank my fill and considered falling asleep right there in the rocks, but the sudden thought of bears, wolves, and cougars in the forest changed my mind. So, without a cave in sight, I climbed a tree and nestled into the thickest spot between three branches and crossed my fingers that I'd survive a fall into the ravine if I happened to roll to the left.

The girl's last words remained in my head as I fell asleep, and tears I thought dried up slipped from my eyes as I curled into the tree.

"'Please, just make something if your freedom. Make sure your life was worth the ones we lost.'"

* * *

I don't think I slept for very long. My life had become so simple that it consisted only of the basics for survival, however long it had been: eat, sleep, drink, run.

When I woke up, it was still dark. I lowered myself through the branches and to the ground, and walked in the direction I thought I'd been heading in earlier. I didn't want to end up back at the compound—or what was left of it—and I definitely didn't want to end up kneeling next to the girl's body. It had been hard enough to pry myself away the first time. Doing it again would be too much.

I walked until the sun was high in the sky, and the air had gone from what felt like freezing (although it wasn't even as cold as it had been in the cage) to just warm enough to be almost _too_ warm.

When at last I found a sign of human life, darkness had fallen again and I had stopped to rest, drink, and pocket some wild strawberries four times.

It didn't look like a very nice place. Weeds had grown over the stone garden barriers around the front, and shards of broken glass littered the area. But through a window, which I crept up to, I saw life. Kind of, anyway. The light was dim, the air was smoky, and wooden shelves lined with dark bottles covered the wall behind the bar. That's what it was; a bar. This was a bar. It was surrounded by the same trees I'd been walking through for a day, but a highway ran along the left, and as I strained to see past the light of the bar, which, although dim, was blinding compared to the darkness of the forest, I could make out a small hotel, a gas station, and a little diner. They were all the roadside rest-stop types; places truckers and bikers and travelers might stop at.

Turning back to the window, I caught sight of a TV someone's head had been blocking. A static-interrupted newscast flickered across it. I was more interested in the date and time, though. Thursday. I'd been missing since Monday night, which meant I'd spend all of Tuesday and Wednesday caged, and spent a day walking. I'd been gone for three days. Had anyone noticed I wasn't there? If my parents really fought as much as Dahlia had said they did, and I'd almost become as recluse as Janine, would my disappearance be anything more than a statistic to add to the charts?

I had never felt so alone.

So I was pretty surprised when a voice behind me said, "Are you lost, young lady?"

I whirled around. The voice I'd heard had sounded like it would match up with the description of the guy. Big (not fat, but muscular and tall and thick) and tattooed, wearing dark leather and jeans, with long hair, dark glasses, and a motorcycle helmet under one arm. Although he had a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, it was unlit and he didn't look as seedy and dangerous as the bar did.

"Um…yes. Where am I?"

"Amartina's Bar and Grill," the man said, but he sounded amused. "Northern Connecticut."

I don't know how many questions he asked, or even how I answered them. All I knew was that I was too tired to refuse the ride he offered me, even though I knew how dangerous hitchhiking could be. I fell asleep and woke up in Stoneybrook, when the man nudged my shoulder and announced that I was home.

I'd given him Bobbi's address. I crossed my fingers as I thanked the man and hoped Dahlia didn't answer the door.

* * *

"Claudia?!"

Bobbi looked horrified. Much like the girl from Wyeth's cages, my clothes were tattered. My hands and face were smudged with dirt and mud. My clothes were filthy. I'm sure I smelled horrible. But Bobbi threw her arms around me, and I felt myself relax slightly into the comforting human contact I hadn't even known I needed.

She led me upstairs and made me take a shower. She let me borrow some clean clothes. And then, with a hot TV dinner in front of me, she sat down and waited for me to tell her where I'd been.

"Everyone's been searching," she said. "It's been all over the news."

"Maybe the guy I hitchhiked back with recognized me," I said, and between bites of mushy chicken, peas, and carrots, I told Bobbi the whole story.

"It was horrible," I finally said, when I was done.

I hoped she believed me. Most wouldn't, since her own sister was involved. But Bobbi looked at me seriously and nodded, with a look in her eyes like she understood.

"About how many people died?" Bobbi asked, and when my mind flashed back to my rescuer, and Ashley, and the other innocent prisoners who had died, I burst into tears.

Bobbi cringed. "I'm sorry," she said, and I squeezed her hand and tried to stop crying.

I managed to keep talking, but it was hard. Bobbi's eyes, too, were bright with tears.

"I have to call my mother," she said finally. "I have to…I have to help. This has to end. This has to have…some kind of happy ending. This whole situation has been unreal."

Then, just as Bobbi squeezed my hand once more and stood up, we heard the front door open. We froze and looked at each other.

A glance of dirty blonde hair in the hallway was all we needed to know who it was.

My torturer.

Dahlia was home.

* * *

**Author's Note: Yup, Dahlia lives. And so do I. We were moving, so I wanted to work on this and couldn't. It feels SO good to be back to it. I have a beginning idea for the next chapter (no, this still isn't over) and hopefully, I won't have another five**-**day wait between updates. Oh…and FORTY**-**SIX reviews?? Awesome! Thank you all SO much!!**

**Oh, and the book mentioned in this chapter, about the boy who has to understand pleasure to understand pain, is actually book 43 of the _Animorphs_ series, of which I'm obsessed. The way that was written was much better than this chapter, but I'm tired and I'm not sure I can do such a subject any better... :P**


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter 18**

**POV: Bobbi**

Because my mother has probably never worn a wool tuque in the house (or cargo pants, combat boots, or tank tops, for that matter) I knew Dahlia was home. I ushered Claudia, who looked absolutely terrified, into a closet. Then, before I could change my mind, I hurried into the foyer and found Dahlia shrugging out of her parka and looking annoyed. But aside from her look of annoyance (which isn't unusual for her; she almost always looks sarcastic or annoyed) she looked worse than usual. Her face was bruised and smudged with something black, and her clothes, which probably haven't been washed in at least a month, looked tattered and burned.

"Where have you been?" I asked, and wondered then what Dahlia would think of my question. It could sound suspicious—or like I was prying, which Dahlia seemed to think everyone did.

"Out," my twin replied, but she didn't sound annoyed by my question. She didn't even seem aware of my presence.

_But if you've been dealing with people you've locked up and tortured in some castle prison in some remote area, it's no wonder the pesky questions of your sister don't have priority in your thoughts_, I thought. Looking her over, she did look like she'd been in an explosion. Claudia had mentioned something about explosives, hadn't she?

And I definitely believed Claudia. The look in her eyes hadn't suggested she was playing a joke on me. Besides, she'd been missing for days. _That_ was definitely not a joke.

When Dahlia had retreated to her bedroom, I hurried back to the closet I'd convinced Claudia to go into (even though the thought of being enclosed in such a small space after being locked up in a cage for two days must have been frightening) and helped her out. We had to get her home; her parents had been on the news twice pleading with the public for information about their missing daughter, and sheltering her here was against the law. And it would be immoral. Her ordeal was enough without having to be delayed.

"Why didn't you go straight home?" I asked her, when I helped her up. She stepped from the closet, looking a little bewildered.

"Because I knew you would help. And Dahlia is your sister," she replied, but she shook her head. "It's not important. There are at least fifty people dead in the place I was held. I don't know how your twin survived, but she did. A man, Wyeth…he was in charge of that place. Dahlia was his assistant. We have to get help."

"This will be quite a story to tell the police," I said. "But wait. I want to call my mother, too. You and I may both need a lawyer. But I don't think my mother should represent any of us. Dahlia, either."

"Then what good would calling her do?"

"My mother may not be there for me when it comes to the things a mother should be responsible for, but when it comes to the law and her job, she's amazing," I replied. I picked up the phone.

"Wait," Claudia said, and something about her voice made me obey. She was watching me with a puzzled expression.

"What?"

"Well…why did you believe me so easily? Most people would be shocked by what I told you. Most people wouldn't even listen."

"As far-fetched as most of it may seem, I've learned not to underestimate the strange things that can happen," I replied, hanging up. "Dahlia has been sneaking out late at night. While she _could_ be seeing a boy, I doubt she is. For one thing, she'd be bragging about it. For another, she rarely leaves the house during the day anymore. And that's when most people our age do most of our dating, since between school, work, and friends, sleep becomes important."

"Isn't she a dropout who usually stays at home, aside from dates?"

"Yes, and it's exactly why this is so strange. Dahlia has always been the kind of person who enjoyed bedtime as a little kid and would do almost anything for a few more minutes of sleep each morning. She usually had to rush around in the morning to be ready on time because she overslept."

I stopped talking and frowned. "We can't sit around and discuss bad sleeping habits right now. You're in trouble."

Claudia sighed and nodded. "Yes, I know."

I called my mother. Then, looking nervous, Claudia called hers.

I don't know what Claudia's mother said, but Claudia spent the next few minutes nodding, smiling, and looking exasperated, as well as repeating "I'm fine," about seven million times. When at last Claudia hung up, it was because her father had come to the front door.

The reunion was brief.

I don't think the next half hour made any sense at all. Claudia and her father hurried down to the police station. Because Claudia said it might not be safe for Dahlia to be around anyone, she and her father both insisted I go with them, which I wasn't particularly upset about. My sister was a criminal (innocent until proven guilty, but since I don't work with the law I don't have to think that way) and because she had hurt Claudia, I would rather make sure Claudia was safe than keep up a pretense. But I made Claudia's father stop at the preschool so I could bring Kerry with me. (There was no way I was going to leave her there. She would have been let out in an hour, anyway.) It was eleven A.M., and if Claudia had been able to remember the details correctly (and if the clock in the trucker's rig had been right) she had been about seven hours north of home. Kerry's teacher seemed surprised, but I told her (in a flat tone of voice I've heard Dahlia use) that it was an emergency.

"Is Mom okay?" she asked, struggling with her tiny knapsack. I helped her put on her coat and picked her up.

"Yes, she's fine. But…um, well, you and I are going to spend the day together, okay?" I knew I didn't have to pretend Kerry was too innocent to understand, but because Claudia's father was there, he'd probably think it was strange that I spoke to a little girl like she was my age. Besides, there was no time to explain. In what had felt like ten seconds since we closed the car door, we'd reached the police station.

I had never been to the police station before I met Claudia. I hoped it wasn't all a false alarm—most people would crack before it came to a ride to the police station, anyway.

Claudia certainly didn't look like she was joking, either. She kept her hands clasped together tightly in her lap, and stared out the window.

We were seated right away in a small room. I guessed it was because Claudia had been missing for so long. But then it was a long time before an officer was sent in to talk to us, and I sat back. Claudia and I would probably do a lot of the talking, but I knew the police would want to ask more of Claudia because she'd been the one kidnapped and held hostage.

I was right, and listened as Claudia retold her story. (In the middle, Claudia's mother and sister hurried in, but were told to take a seat. They didn't ask any questions, but I could see that they were just as eager to talk to Claudia as I was to have Dahlia behind bars where I could talk to her. At least then she wouldn't be able to run off.) Maybe she'd even be eager to talk to me, even if only to tell enough lies for me to think she was innocent of all she was accused of.

"Are you sure there was an explosion?" the officer finally asked, when Claudia had finished up with telling the officer she'd hitchhiked home and gone straight to my house. "Are you sure the man in charge was Wyeth?"

Claudia nodded. "All I know about the explosion is what I heard from the girl who saved me. But she died, and her clothes were burned."

"So were Dahlia's," I reflected. "She definitely looked like she'd been in an explosion."

"Do you know where you were held?" the female officer asked, but before Claudia could answer, my mother burst in. She looked livid.

"Questioning minors without parental consent is—"

She hesitated when she saw us all sitting there, staring at her.

She took a seat in the chair beside Claudia's sister wordlessly, and before anyone could say anything, Dahlia walked in.

And back out, rather quickly, escorted by two officers. My mother followed them, talking about appeals, false allegations, and the rights of minors. She mentioned something about custody, but I wasn't paying much attention. Claudia's face had become an ashy white, and her body had stiffened. She looked like she was about to faint.

"Was that the girl?" one of the remaining officers asked, just as the other said, "Why did you go straight to Bobbi Battista's house? Why didn't you just go straight home?"

"That was her," Claudia confirmed. "I knew Bobbi would help me, even though it was her own sister."

The police turned their attention to me.

Then, because the police had been involved in my life within the past month, Claudia and I told the whole story—how I'd decided Kerry should have one regular baby-sitter so she had someone new to trust; how Claudia had come to think she was being abused; and how other people seemed to get so involved.

"Do you know of anyone who could have hurt Kerry?" one of the officers asked me, while the other took over Claudia's questioning.

"My sister has never been very kind to her," I replied. "Dahlia hasn't been, I mean. Never abusive, as far as I know. Dahlia used to just roll her eyes whenever Kerry entered a room, or brought a toy to her, or whatever it was she did. She took off before she could be asked to watch Kerry, and refused to do so even when she hadn't been able to make her escape in time. But about seven months ago, Kerry and Dahlia were alone together for a little while and Kerry has never wanted to even walk beside her since. I checked her for bruises and asked her about it, but I think Dahlia might have just said something that upset her. Kerry won't tell me, and Dahlia just says it's nobody's business but her own." (I felt I should explain to the officer then why Dahlia didn't like Kerry, reasons like Kerry wasn't our father's daughter) and he wrote them down on a little notepad.

Across the room, Claudia was crying. Her family sat apart from her, watching and probably listening but not moving to comfort her. I felt a chill.

"You two should have come to us right away," the officer handing Claudia a tissue said gently, "but I think you've both handled this extremely well." She looked uncertainly at the other officer. "Can you remember where you were being held?"

"In hell," Claudia replied, but shrugged and nodded. "I don't know. I think it was here." She pointed to a spot on the map.

Before I could read the words she was pointing to, I felt a tug on my belt. Kerry was watching me, looking curious.

"Bobbi? I'm hungry," she said. "Can we go get a chocolate bar?"

One of the officers pointed me to a snack machine just down the hall, and I bought several chocolate bars and a can of Coke. She and I seated ourselves on a bench in the hallway. Through a big window too high up for Kerry to see through, I could see Claudia crying again. This time, her parents each had her enveloped in a hug, and the officers looked a little emotional, too. (I'd figured I wasn't going to be questioned further, and that Kerry didn't need to see everyone crying and talking about things she should never have to know about. It was bad enough she'd been there while Claudia and I told the officers everything we could remember.)

Mom returned and joined us stiffly in the hallway.

"Dahlia's in jail," she said curtly. "Bobbi, would you care to explain?"

I was saved by an officer when she led Mom into a private office to talk to her. Kerry's eyes were wide, but she didn't ask.

"Everything will be okay," I tried to reassure her anyway. Although I didn't know what would happen, I knew Kerry didn't need to know that. I smoothed down a wrinkle in Kerry's skirt (which was part of what Mom insists is 'an outfit' even though it consists of a plain pink tank top, white lace skirt, white tights, pink dress shoes, and a matching pink and white ribbon in her hair.)

"But what if it isn't?" Kerry replied, to which I didn't have an answer.

"It will be," I finally said, sounding as convincing as Mom usually did when she promised we'd have some time 'together' during an upcoming weekend. And since she knew as well as we did that it wouldn't happen, it wasn't a very convincing tone. Kerry recognized it and gave me a look.

So, instead of trying to pretend everything would be fine (something I had to do a lot but still hated) I picked her up and settled her into my lap for a hug. She relaxed almost right away—I'd known she would. Although I'd sounded like Mom, I wasn't much like her. Mom, like Dahlia, seems to regard Kerry as a mistake. She keeps her at arm's length, as though treating Kerry like she doesn't exist means Mom never cheated on Dad and didn't accidentally wind up pregnant. Mom never hugs Kerry. I always do.

"I'm glad it wasn't you that ended up in jail," Kerry mumbled almost incoherently into my neck, and I sighed lightly, stroking her pale hair.

"Me, too." I rubbed her back a little, which used to be the best way to get her to fall asleep, and by the time Mom was ushered from the office (with the officer behind her, obviously not trusting Mom not to try and break Dahlia out of her cell) Kerry was almost asleep.

"You just tell the warden we'll be back!" our mother yelled, startling Kerry so much that she flinched and whimpered in unison, now definitely awake.

She stumbled to the car and drove away. I glanced down at Kerry, then up at the officers who had gathered around in case Mom had a fit. They were now looking at me.

"Would you like a ride home, miss?" one asked, with an expression that indicated he was both glad Mom was gone but sorry for me.

"I think I'd rather wait for Claudia," I said, gesturing to her, "and maybe we'll stay with her tonight. I don't particularly feel like going home."

I hadn't meant to say it that way, but I saw more expressions of pity than I'd seen at my father's funeral. Several nodded.

"Claudia will be ready to leave soon," the woman said, as I stood up to reposition Kerry more comfortably. "I think it'll do her some good to have friends around right now. You've both been through an awful lot."

"Like you need to tell me," I joked, suppressing a yawn, and several officers laughed as they headed back to their offices or duties, or wherever cops go while in the station.

The female officer stayed behind, though. She seemed curious.

While she asked me questions (mostly about my twin sister and mother) she and Kerry played a hand game. It was nice to see Kerry distracted, or at least pretending to be.

"I raise Kerry by myself," I admitted. "I have been since I was fourteen. I didn't want to ask for help because Mom was too upset about Dad's death to do anything other than work harder, and Dahlia refused to have anything to do with Kerry because her father wasn't the same father as ours. I thought Kerry could be taken away." I hesitated. I hoped it wasn't still a possibility. "I'll be eighteen soon, and I just graduated, so it's not like I don't have the time now to take care of her."

The officer shook her head, looking surprised. "Unfortunately, you aren't the only teenager who's had to take on such a big task. Luckily, you seem to be one of the few who manages to adjust and do well."

"So you won't take me away?" Kerry asked, the game forgotten.

The officer shook her head. "No, of course not. If Bobbi was younger and less responsible, it might be an option. But she's at a mature age and obviously good at taking care of children, so I think the best thing to do is leave well enough alone."

Kerry turned and threw her arms around me.

"However, considering the circumstances, we should place you both under surveillance. Dahlia's coworkers may know who you are, and considering her grievances, you two are both likely targets. Also, for the sake of the law, we should supervise your parenting until you turn eighteen, simply because you don't seem to have much parental assistance." She grinned. "Otherwise, the public may be in an outrage and it's possible that things _could_ get worse."

"Um…all of that sounds fine, except that my mother may not be particularly happy with any of us right now. I don't want to go home," I added. "Do you think you could talk to the Kishi family? And could I talk to Dahlia?"

"Yes and yes," the woman said, and stood up. "I'm sure they'll be happy to help you out, since you helped their daughter."

"I don't think Dahlia will be so happy to see you," Kerry replied, and I glanced down at her.

"I'll bet you're right," I agreed.

* * *

I expected the worst from Dahlia as I approached her room. (Apparently, she couldn't be put into a regular cell until she'd been formally arrested, and that couldn't be done until there'd been an investigation.) Still, although it would be weird to see her locked up, I was glad they weren't letting her out.

Although I was as eager for the investigation to find the truth as anyone else probably was, I couldn't help but feel slightly happy that she was finally in a position where if I spoke, she had nowhere to run—no doors to slam, no windows to jump out of. And a little part of me that had always wanted revenge (she was always out, care-free, while I was stuck at home) was finally satisfied when I saw her, unable to leave a guarded six-by-six room. It was like we were each finally able to see things from the other's perspective.

"Are you happy? You get to be me," Dahlia said, when I stopped. I had to stand outside and talk to her through a window covered in bars, and speak through a barred hole in the middle.

Before I could talk, Dahlia stood. (Since the guards were outside the only door, across from the window we were talking through—and it was the _only_ window her room had—nobody yelled at her to sit down or reached for a taser. She glared at me.

"For once, I'm you. Stuck," she explained. "Trapped. And you're free."

"I am...I'm free because I'm sane," I replied, trying to choose my words carefully. "I didn't capture several hundred people and cage them away in some remote prison."

"Ironic, isn't it? And I always thought you were so smart," my twin sneered. I didn't even want to think of her as a sister, as _my_ sister. "While you were caged into a life of parenting before you were even physically capable of producing a baby, I was caging the people who hurt me. It was just too bad you weren't in Claudia's place. _She_ was supposed to be the experiment. Claudia was supposed to be the bait."

"You see? You're insane," I said. "You're sick."

"You _believe_ them, Bobbi? You believe everything you're told? You do everything you're supposed to do? Let me tell you something, Bobbi. Life isn't always about coloring in the lines and following the instructions."

"Dahlia, I think even following the absolute basics of humanity would be enough. At least following the rules keeps me free," I said, indicating the space on each side of me (I was standing in an empty corridor, which was like a long, private room.) I raised my arms on each side of me, something she could do only if she stood in the middle of the room. "The basic principles and morals of humanity are built into our minds. You just don't have the intellect to read them."

She sneered, readying to speak. To insult me. To point out how pitiful my good-girl life had been compared to hers.

"Yes, maybe I did spent several Saturday nights changing diapers when I could have been making out behind a Dumpster somewhere, but I found spending time with _our sister_ to be much more rewarding," I said, before she could try to confuse me into thinking the opposite. Her eyes darkened. "At least I'm not the one without a place to go now."

I'd had enough. I was out of words. And Kerry was waiting for me.

I turned my back on my twin and headed down the hall. I expected Dahlia's voice to echo off the walls and follow me through the doors, then follow me home and invade my nightmares. I expected her to watch me leave, piercing me with imaginary bullets and use the memory of me to throw mental darts into. I expected her to call out her last words, an _au revoir_ to make me feel like my speech had been ineffective. But the only thing following me down the hall was silence.

* * *

**Author's Note: My computer is being an absolute pain today. Grr…  
(And I know this should have been a 'Dahlia' chapter, but my ideas for this chapter, again unplanned, wouldn't have made as much sense from her POV...)**


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter 19**

My parents agreed quickly to Bobbi and Kerry staying with us, which surprised me. I expected them to whisk me out of the police station and hurry me home, where they'd monitor me until I was twenty-one. But I think they were too shocked and relieved by my safe return to care much about anything else.

Personally, I was glad. Bobbi and I probably had a lot to talk about—namely, what was going to happen next. And in a time when I wanted to be surrounded by friends, Bobbi was one of the people closest to me, despite everything we'd been through.

Kerry clung to Bobbi when we reached my house. She looked nervous, and I hoped she wasn't too upset. I didn't know what had happened between Bobbi and her mother while I'd been answering questions, but I doubted it had been pleasant. Bobbi mentioned that she'd spoken to Dahlia, but shook her head and indicated that she'd tell me about it later. She looked sad.

_Well, of course she's sad, you moron,_ I thought. _Her sister is in jail!_

I wanted to talk to Bobbi right away, but my parents had other ideas. They took me into the downstairs den for a talk—which meant they asked a lot of questions, and I answered them all. Janine took Bobbi and Kerry upstairs, and I hoped Kerry would fall asleep.

When my parents decided I'd had enough (I think they were hoping _I'd_ fall asleep) they let me go back upstairs. I guessed they would be checking on me constantly. Secretly, I hoped they would. I'd missed them, although life was still too chaotic for a reunion. Maybe part of the reason I felt that way was because of the whole ordeal, but I still secretly felt that it wasn't over yet, though what I was expecting, I wasn't sure.

That was why I felt I had to talk to Bobbi.

Kerry was asleep, curled up and clutching the blanket draped over her, at the foot of the guest bed. Bobbi and Janine were standing just outside of the room, the door open. They fell silent as I approached.

Janine gave me a hug before disappearing into her room.

"Kerry's asleep," Bobbi whispered. "She must have been exhausted." (It was barely seven. We'd spent hours at that police station.)

I nodded.

"Want to talk?"

I nodded again, although I'd suddenly found that I was unsure of exactly what to say. Bobbi led me down the hall, so that we could sit on the top stairs. I think she wanted to keep her little sister in sight.

"Dahlia wasn't pleased about being in jail," Bobbi said. "I had the chance to talk to her, though. I made Kerry stay outside with the officers. I figured Dahlia wouldn't have too many pleasant things to say." She looked a little embarrassed, but tears glimmered in her eyes. "Mom wasn't very happy, either. In her world, life revolves around work. All of this is a nuisance to her."

"I'm sure she was just upset that in a month, both of her daughters made their names known around the police station," I suggested, but neither of us laughed. Bobbi shook her head slowly.

I don't know how long we sat there, talking quietly. But when I realized I was tired, Bobbi had already leaned into the railing and closed her eyes, as if she was hoping sleep would overtake her right there on the staircase.

"How about we talk tomorrow?" I asked.

Bobbi opened her eyes and tried to smile, but yawned instead. So she nodded sleepily and waved, standing up and staggered towards the guest room. She looked like she hadn't slept in weeks.

I made my way to my room and collapsed into bed. It felt great to stretch out on a flat, padded surface. I fell asleep within seconds (even though it was only about eight P.M.) and slept until almost eleven A.M. the next morning. Since I wasn't about to be ready for school for a few days, I wasn't worried. Bobbi and Kerry were already up, but nobody said anything about my sleeping late.

Bobbi, wearing what she'd worn yesterday, smiled up at me. She was perched stiffly on the couch, playing absently with one of her earrings. (She was wearing a simple blue tank top under a black sweater, with matching black sweat pants and white sneakers. Her earrings were cute little blue hoops.) Kerry, wearing a dress I recognized as being one of my old ones, was brushing her wet hair and watching Bugs Bunny chase a robotic carrot down a dirt highway.

"Sleep well?" Bobbi asked.

I nodded. "Yes…did you?"

"Fairly. Kerry woke up twice, but otherwise, I'd have slept all night." She glanced at Kerry, who appeared distracted, then stood up and leaned over to me. "She wet the bed and had a nightmare. Then, she was scared because she didn't recognize the room."

"Ah." That explained why she was wearing my old dress. "Wasn't she potty-trained?"

"Of course. But stress can cause kids to relapse," Bobbi explained. "I changed the sheet already. I hope that's okay."

"Of course," I replied.

Bobbi smiled. "Okay. Well, we know you and your family should spend some time together, so I'm going to take Kerry home. Mom called this morning, and she sounded much calmer."

"Okay," I answered, but I felt my heart sinking. I'd wanted to talk to Bobbi again. We'd agreed the night before that the trouble wasn't over yet (after all, the police were just beginning the investigation) and that we should keep in touch, but I still felt like our conversation had ended only because we were tired.

"How about you and I meet for a late lunch later?" Bobbi asked. "I'll probably bring Kerry, but we can still talk."

"Okay," I agreed, feeling better. "Where?"

"How about that new soda shop?" Bobbi suggested. "I've already taken Kerry there, and they make great floats."

"Okay. Sounds good," I said. "Three o'clock?"

"Sure. See you there," Bobbi said, and within fifteen minutes, she'd gathered Kerry's clothes, thanked my parents, given me a hug, and reminded me to meet her as she left.

My mother shot me a questioning look.

"We have a lot to talk about," I explained, "so we were going to meet later at The Fizz."

"'The Fizz?'" Janine repeated.

"Are you serious? You were kidnapped, held in a cage for two days, spent a third walking, a fourth answering questions in a police station, and you want to spend your first full day at home with a friend drinking soda?"

"We have to figure out what to do next," I protested. "And if it makes you feel better, I'll order water."

"It isn't about sugar, Claudia. You have been through a lot. One would expect you to want to sit home and relax with your family."

"And the police are handling the investigation, so what do you think you _could_ do?"

"I _do_ want to spend time with my family," I protested, feeling annoyed. "Believe me, I thought about you a lot when I was in the cage, which was a hell of a lot easier than thinking about the stuff happening around me." (I rarely use words like that in front of my family, but they didn't bat an eye.) "And Bobbi and I have been together on this for a while now—" (When we weren't fighting, anyway, but this wasn't the time to mention that) "—so we have to finish it."

My mother looked annoyed, but my father's expression had softened. I wondered which of them would decide my day.

"You may go," my father said, earning a glare from my mother, "but I'm going to drive you there and pick you up in exactly ninety minutes, okay?"

"Okay," I agreed, knowing it was better than nothing. I hurried upstairs to shower and change.

Just when I was stepping into a stream of hot water, Dahlia's words flashed through my mind.

'_Your parents have been fighting for months, Claudia. You thought they were working longer hours because you were older? They just can't stand to be together in the same room anymore!'_

Listening to them (I could hear their voices over the shower!) I began to wonder if she'd been right.

* * *

I spotted Bobbi and Kerry in one of the corner booths at the very back of the soda shop, which meant that we had a great view of the ocean. I knew it was also because the back booths are the most private.

(Bobbi handed me a bag with the dress Kerry had been wearing that morning in it when I sat down. Both had showered and dressed, now wearing their own clothes.)

"How did it go?" I asked, as soon as the waitress had taken our orders (three hot fudge sundaes) and skated away.

"With my mother? Pretty well, considering. She had a lot of questions, mostly about you. She thinks that every time you show up, one of us ends up being questioned by the police."

"She's right," I replied, and we both laughed. It felt good to laugh.

"Okay. Well, it's official. Dahlia's got her own cell," Bobbi said. She paused while our sundaes were delivered. When the girl skated away for the second time, Bobbi leaned closer to me.

"Her own cell?" I prompted.

"Yes. Apparently, although they couldn't tie Dahlia in…yet…to the crime scene up north, they found a loaded gun in her bedroom and other things—rope, chains, matches, keys—which I think they assume are for the cages—and a binder full of pictures. If the remains found up north match up to any of the pictures, which come with enough information about each person to make Dahlia a serious, high-risk stalker if nothing else, she's going to be in jail for the rest of her life."

"Wow," I managed, although my reply sounded lame. "I'm sorry."

"So am I. If not for me wanting to have a regular person in our lives, you'd never have become one of Dahlia's victims."

"Don't forget about Mr. Wyeth," I replied, my mind flashing as I said his name back to the cages. I could still see his cold eyes, see Ashley's pain—

"Are you okay?"

My ice-cream forgotten, I stared into the crystal-style dish and wished I could wipe the last week from my mind. Was Ashley dead?

I didn't have to speak for Bobbi to understand. She apologized, but I shook my head and forced the tears into oblivion by blinking rapidly before I looked up. I didn't want to upset Kerry, who was alternating between eating her sundae and coloring on the paper place-mats under each bowl. (The place even provided crayons and little table games.)

Bobbi looked uncomfortable. "Do you want to talk about something else?"

"No. We can't," I said, and stifled a sniffle. "My father will be here in an hour and fifteen minutes or so, and I'll bet he and my mother will want to spend every remaining minute of the day with me." _Just like that time we were on that island,_ I thought. _Mom was pretty clingy then, too._

"Overprotective?" Bobbi joked, but nodded. "I understand. I once went missing, and my mother didn't let me out of her sight for three _months_."

"Oh," I groaned. "I hope my mother doesn't take that long."

"She'll probably take longer. I was only gone for an hour. I got lost on the way home from school. _You_ were kidnapped and gone for three days."

I nodded. "Okay. So, um…Mr. Wyeth…"

"Oh, right. Yes." Bobbi hesitated, taking the opportunity to take a bite of her melting ice-cream, and when she couldn't think of anything right away, she took another.

"Well…he had a niece," I said. "I think I remember someone saying something about that in…wherever I was. But I knew his niece. Ashley Wyeth. We used to go to school together. She was…she was there, with me…I think she was still there when we left." I resisted the urge to grit my teeth and instead spooned a scoop of chocolate, vanilla, and banana (a mixture that was hot and cold, and mostly, tasty) to avoid the tears threatening to squeeze out.

"I'm sorry," Bobbi replied, and we lapsed into a tense silence.

We turned our topic of conversation over to much lighter (and pointless) things, which I guessed was important because I'd had enough of heavy, depressing thoughts. But talking about basketball games, school dances, and boys wasn't going to get us anywhere. It didn't solve any problems, anyway.

"Valentine's Day is coming up," Bobbi said. "Are you going to the dance?"

"Dance? Oh…I forgot about it! Wait—how do you know about it? You graduated."

"Almost every high-school has a dance for Valentine's Day," Bobbi pointed out.

"Oh. Well, I was…I was even asked out a while ago. But that was before…I mean, he may not want to go with me now. I have no idea how the kids in school will react."

"Don't worry," Bobbi said, in a tone that almost said, '_you have more important things to worry about_,' and tried to smile. "Some might be jealous that you received more attention than they did, but I'm sure many will be glad to have you back."

"Thanks," I said, but I wasn't sure about that. Kids like Alan Gray and Cary Retlin were too common in SMS, and most hadn't seemed any more mature in SHS.

"Well, my father's here," I said reluctantly.

"Hmm? Oh, right. Here," Bobbi said. She handed me a small piece of paper she'd been writing on. "You can contact me any time. That's my private e-mail address."

"Oh, good. That might be easier," I said, standing up.

"No, you go. I'll pay," Bobbi said, and waved me away in a 'shoo' gesture with a smile. "Don't keep him waiting."

"Thanks!"

I hurried out and found my father, looking anxious, in the driver's seat. He was alone. (I was surprised. I'd been wondering if my mother might tag along, just to make sure I was really still breathing. I'd been expecting her to call the soda shop to check on me.

"How did it go?" my father asked, without mentioning my mother.

"Fine. It's still a little hard to talk about, but Bobbi is really good to talk to." I didn't add that she'd given me her e-mail address. I didn't want him reading anything she and I sent to each other.

"You know, honey, you can always come and talk to us about anything that's bothering you. And I'm sure what happened this week is worth talking about, at least a little. Whenever you're ready."

For some reason, this seemed like the perfect time to talk to my father. So, before I could change my mind, I started talking.

"Well…when I was gone, one of the people there was talking about you," I began. "She said you guys have been fighting for a while."

I didn't like the silence that followed. Or the way my father was avoiding my eyes. His grip on the steering wheel seemed too tight.

"We have," my father admitted. "We didn't want to upset you, though. You've been doing so much better with your schoolwork. And…since your life has changed so much in the last year, we figured that added stress of parental upset would be too much."

"Are you going to get divorced?"

I hate the word 'divorced.' It's an ugly, harsh sound. And because I've had multiple friends whose parents divorced (Stacey, Kristy, and Dawn, as three 'off the top of my head' examples) I know it's a reality.

"What? No, of course not. Our fights haven't been major, which is why they've been so easy to hide."

_Fights are always major,_ I thought. _At least, they are if they're worth the energy of arguing over._

I didn't think this was the right time to point that out to my father, though. We had turned the corner to our street, and I could see my mother peering out of the kitchen window.

"Honey," my father began stiffly, "what else did the people…what else were you told?"

I hesitated. To be honest, I couldn't remember a lot of what I'd been told. Somewhere between the first and second day of my imprisonment, I'd become delirious and started to hallucinate. I didn't know what had really happened and what I'd imagined.

Also, I really didn't want to think about it. Most of it wasn't pleasant, and anyway, I was free now. I wanted my life to go back to normal—waking up in a bed, smelling coffee, and go to school, where the worst that could happen was that you find a zit your bangs won't cover and that you almost always trip on the stairs into the cafeteria and start an avalanche of people and trays of food.

"If you don't want to talk about it, it's okay—" my father began.

We had reached home and were parked in the driveway. For a few long seconds, we just sat there in silence.

"I do," I said. "But not now. I just want to forget it ever happened."

Inside, my father headed for the kitchen, and I pretended to head up the stairs. Halfway up, when my father was out of sight, I hurried back down and flattened myself against the wall as my mother came swinging out of the laundry room and followed him.

Perfect. I'd been too busy lately (thinking about Kerry and her family) to pay much attention to my parents, although now that I thought about it, in addition to working more, they were a lot quieter at mealtimes, too, even though we've always discussed most of our lives over a hot meal. But now I wanted to know what was going on (after all, people who didn't even live with us did) and it looked as though _something_ was about to happen.

The very first thing that happened was that my mother started the conversation off with saying my father's name in a crisp, cold tone.

His reply, which I couldn't honestly blame him for, was an equally cold, annoyed 'What?' even though they always taught Janine and I to say 'Pardon' or 'Excuse me' instead of 'what' or 'huh.'

"How could you let Claudia out?" my mother asked. She sounded accusing. I wished I could see them, and crept closer to the kitchen.

"Claudia just spent several days locked up—"

"Exactly! She's in danger! People want her! We can't let her out of our sight—"

"—So I didn't think keeping her locked up here was going to help anyone—"

They kept interrupting each other.

"Claudia is a very mature, very responsible fourteen-year-old girl," my father finally said, his voice calm and cold but firm and factual. "She's been through a lot. Keeping her under twenty-four hour supervision for the next month isn't going to help her."

"It _might_ keep her safe!"

"Do you have any idea what Claudia told me in the car?" my father replied, and I tensed.

"What?" my mother snapped, her voice growing louder. "What can she possibly tell you, her father, that she wouldn't tell _me_, her mother?"

"Her captives told her we'd been fighting. She might have thought it was a lie, but I told her the truth today. And you know what? I think she's been handling the news pretty well." His voice softened.

"You _told_ her? We _agreed_—"

"I _know,_ but I wasn't thinking much about our 'agreements' anymore! The one about not fighting in front of them was good, but I was honestly preoccupied! Do you know what it means if people who could take a girl from her bedroom know things like that about us?"

"That they're more observant than you are?"

"_No!_" My father yelled, startling me. I hate it when he yells. "It means people have been watching us! We're at risk, too!"

Silence.

I'd stopped inching along. I didn't breathe. I didn't even blink. I suddenly had a lot to think about.

"Listen. We should all get out of here," my father said, obviously feeling like he was supposed to try and control the situation.

"Oh, what? You don't think we should try to keep our lives as sane as we can right now, especially now? You, the big strong man, can't protect us?"

The silence following that was so short and tense that I was sure my father was looking for something to throw.

"Like it or not," he said, his voice still calm and emotionless, but becoming lower and sounding silky with anger, "we are in danger. This has _nothing_ to do with us, all right? Our daughter could be taken again at any time, and I am not going to sit here and wait for someone to decide the rest of our lives for us. So if you want to sit here and stew about our marital issues, you go ahead and do that. But I'm taking Claudia and Janine somewhere else."

"What about custody and legal agreements?"

"Forget the law!" my father said, repeating himself with a word I won't repeat between the words _the_ and_ law_. "This is about our lives!"

I curled into a ball in the closet I'd backed into and cringed as my father stomped past me and up the stairs. I could hear Mom in the kitchen, banging around. I burst into tears, crying quietly, and wondered again about Dahlia. She had been right about my parents fighting. How much of what she'd said had been true? Was my life going to become as bad free as it had been while caged?

* * *

**Author's Note: Only a chapter or two left! No, I haven't been planning this story. I planned a few chapters, but that was it. Most of them hardly followed the plans, anyway… :P  
Poor Claudia. Every time she thinks things have gotten better, something else goes wrong...next up, Chapter 20! I think it's about time Emily called Claudia--I'm sure the girl didn't forget anything that happened, and now that Claudia's been returned home after the ordeal, I'm sure they'll have more to say...but no, this isn't going to be one of those never-ending stories. It'll end. But I might do a sequel someday... :P**


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter 20**

I'd spent Friday at the police station, and I'd spent Saturday sitting in my room. Neither was where I'd wanted to be, but considering the fact that I knew there were worse places to be, I didn't complain. Saturday had been the day I met Bobbi for sundaes. It had also been the day I heard my parents fight.

So I was kind of glad to spend some time alone in my room and pretend I hadn't heard the fighting between my parents. It was shockingly nice to be back in a place I belonged, even if I had been kidnapped from here. (But I felt fairly safe now, because a police car was parked in front of the house just in case.)

Not long after I'd crept to my room, noticing my father's closed bedroom door, I heard a knock. I crossed my fingers and answered.

It was Janine.

"They've been fighting," she whispered, stepping in and closing the door behind her. "I wasn't aware of it until recently, but considering everything you've been through, I didn't think it was the right time to discuss it."

"I heard them," I said.

"Everybody heard them," Janine replied. She and I seated ourselves (Janine in my desk chair, facing me on the bed) and snacked our way through a bag of Hershey's Kisses before either of us spoke.

"Were you scared?" Janine asked me.

"About the fight? A little—" I admitted.

"No. About…you know. What happened."

Nobody seemed sure of what to call the kidnapping and everything after that, and yet, we always knew what 'you know' or 'what happened' really was.

"Yes," I admitted, and this time, Janine didn't interrupt. "I knew I'd read about those things, and gotten used to thinking about them. But nothing compares to seeing it, or feeling it. When you read it, you can see that it isn't real. But this was _too_ real."

Janine nodded. She didn't understand, of course, but she could pretend. She did.

"I just hope everything works out," I said, with a sigh. Janine stood up to leave, but she turned and nodded.

"It will," she said encouragingly. "_Everything_ will work out."

I smiled, but I didn't feel any happiness.

Janine closed my door behind her, and just as I was about to stretch out, my phone rang. I reached for it and slumped down on my bed.

"Hello?"

"Claudia?" It was Emily. "Oh, I'm _so_ glad you're okay!"

_I'm not okay_, I thought, and I almost said it out loud. But Emily didn't seem aware of my silence.

"So what happened to you? Did you get lost?"

_Suddenly, what really happened seems really insignificant somehow_, I thought. Even Emily suddenly seemed just as superficial as everyone else. She hadn't ever been through what I had. Although being locked into an attic by people who were supposed to be looking after her seemed pretty similar all of a sudden. But even so, I couldn't help but wonder suddenly if Bobbi and I had more in common than I could ever have with anyone else. She may not have been locked up anywhere, but she certainly understood stress and the horrors of life the way most girls (and boys) my age and even some adults never would.

"No," I finally answered. "I was kidnapped."

"What? Really? Are you kidding?"

Emily's voice still held a laughing sound that I couldn't help but be annoyed by, and yet, after all we'd been through, she couldn't believe me when my disappearance had made the news?

(So had my return, actually. I'd done two interviews that day, one for the local newspaper and another for the local televised news. I hoped they'd show the footage soon.)

"I'm not kidding," I replied. "You'll probably see it in Sunday's newspaper."

"Wow," Emily managed. For some reason, even that response annoyed me.

But, for another unknown reason, I didn't say anything about it. I just stayed silent. I didn't want Emily to feel like I was pushing her away. But I suddenly didn't feel as comfortable with her as I had.

Could it be because Dahlia had said something about Emily that I didn't quite remember? It seemed to me that she had, but I wasn't sure. But had she been telling me Emily was going to reach the same fate I had, or had she made up a lie about her? Or, like with my parents, had she known a truth about her that I didn't?

I glanced around my room in the silence that followed Emily's half-hearted response to my news. I was glad to still have a room of my own—my father hadn't carried through on his threat-slash-promise of taking me off to some safe place (as if there was one; Dahlia had said 'they' would find me and since they had managed to break into my room easily, I didn't doubt it was true) and my mother hadn't made me move in with them so they could keep an eye on me.

"Well, I, um…" Emily stammered. "Uh, I guess I'll be keeping an eye on the news."

That was it? It was like she was calling just to see if the whole thing had been some elaborate plan for me to call attention to myself.

Suddenly, although it was unlikely, it sounded suspiciously a lot like the time someone had called the BSC. It had been when Mallory's father lost his job, and when friends found out, they shied away from Mallory like she carried a contagious plague. When her father finally found another job, Mallory decided to host a party—and some of the girls who had been teasing her about it called and asked, in a pretty subtle way, if they were invited. It had sounded like the girl calling was talking to someone else, as if someone with her was feeding her what to say over the phone.

Instead of asking, since Emily would deny it even if it were true, I just said, "Okay."

That was it. It wasn't at all like the conversations we'd had on the phone when she suspected Bobbi of abusing Kerry. Now that I knew Bobbi, it felt like a ridiculous thought. But she'd almost convinced me of it, and Emily was nothing if not persistent.

_Maybe I can only have one friend at a time,_ I thought._ For a while, it was Emily. Now it seems like my only real friend is Bobbi. And what's really strange is, it seems like I have to be suspicious of someone before (and after) I can or have been a friend to that person or those people._

It was kind of a stupid thought, but as I hung up, I couldn't help but wonder if it was true.

_It seems like you doubt yourself a lot now_, I thought, and instantly pushed that one out of my head. The last thing I needed right now was to doubt myself, especially when it had looked only a few days earlier like I was about to lose everything else.

"Claudia?"

"Huh?" With a start, I realized that the phone had rung again, and that I'd answered it without even realizing it.

For the next hour or so, my phone kept ringing. Clients, former and current, called to make sure I was really home. One sounded hesitant, but asked if I was available to baby-sit on the following Sunday.

"Tomorrow?" I asked, and the caller (Mrs. Perkins) confirmed it.

"I know you just got home, and should take some time out to rest, but because you've been a regular sitter—I thought I should ask."

"Actually, I think I'll probably be spending a few days here," I said, meaning in my room. "I'm sorry—"

"No, no, it's not a problem," Mrs. Perkins replied. "I've actually got a niece who's been dying for the chance to watch the girls. But I hope you'll eventually—"

"Oh, yes, I'll be baby-sitting again," I interrupted, and forced a laugh into my voice. "But I think it's a little too soon yet."

"No problem, dear," she replied. "Take care of yourself, okay, sweetie?"

When we hung up, the phone rang again. Sleepily, I stared at it. "No problem," I muttered, imitating Mrs. Perkins.

* * *

It was nice of people to be so concerned, but answering phone calls was exhausting me. The BSC had about fifty different families we sat for, and it seemed like every one of them came over or called to make sure I was still in one piece. And that was _before_ the local news channel even aired my interview or any details about me other than that I'd been found, alive, and was back home, recovering.

They didn't add that it was hard to recover with so much attention focused on me. My aunt and uncle came over constantly, clients came with food, Janine hung around and hovered over me like a mosquito protecting a nest full of larvae, and my parents spent as much time with me as they could—as long as it meant spending as little time with each other as possible.

After the news report, people called even more. More visitors came with food, flowers, cards—even candy. Kids from school came to drop off gifts. Some came in to talk to me. Most didn't bother. Emily called to chat. I had nothing to say.

Teachers, even, came to see me. Last year, they probably wouldn't have bothered.

The attention was nice.

But I didn't go to school on Monday. I stayed in bed, where I'd slept most of the weekend away. It used to be that I'd get up early (or sleep in) on the weekends and take any excuse to miss school. But now, I didn't care. I just wanted to sleep. The constant stream of visitors had exhausted me, and aside from bringing me food, water, and asking, just like everyone else did, how I felt, even my parents left me alone most of the time. And all I could do was sleep.

I didn't even search for any of the candy hidden around my room. I didn't do any of the homework my helpful classmates dropped off for me. I didn't even read any of the books in my room, although I had two new mystery novels I'd been eager to start.

But that had all been before, and now, sleeping was what I did best. Aside from my pesky dreams, I didn't have to think.

It was ironic that all I'd had to do in the cage was sleep, and now, in freedom and privacy, I was still sleeping.

On Tuesday afternoon, with the smell of chicken tempting me awake, the doorbell rang. My response was a groan, although it didn't sound like one even to me because of the pillow over my face.

(I'd had a pillow on my face for two reasons—one being the constantly ringing phone and doorbell, even though I'd finally unplugged the phone beside my bed, and the other reason was my parents, who couldn't stop arguing. Mom was convinced I refused to leave my room because she'd fussed about my going out on Saturday, and my father kept telling her she was wrong, which of course only made her angrier, because even when it's in her favor, she hates to be wrong.)

But despite my groan, I was hoping Bobbi would come over. We hadn't seen or heard from each other since Saturday, and despite my lack of enthusiasm for everything else, I still wanted to help her. Because of me, her sister was in jail and Bobbi had been accused of abuse. And although I couldn't do anything about it now, I still felt that she and I should keep in touch—maybe all that had happened had bonded us together.

Heavy footsteps echoed in the foyer, and I sat up, alarmed. Would masked attackers burst in on me, eager to bring me back to the people who had captured me once? Would my attackers be angry now that I'd already escaped them once?

But if the people arriving were out to get me, my mother didn't care. She called, "Claudia! Come down here, please," and I got the strangest feeling from her words. I threw a robe over my pajamas and hurried down the stairs, dizzy from suddenly being upright after so long in bed.

Two police officers waited at the bottom of the stairs. Neither made any mention of my ratty hair or the fact that I probably didn't smell very nice. Both looked grim.

My heart plummeted. Now what?

They led me into the den, which I found strange because both of my parents and my sister followed us in silence.

When we were all sitting, the older officer looked at me.

"We found the facility where you were held," he began, "thanks to some DNA that matches yours. We followed it there."

I held my breath.

"The facility was almost completely destroyed in the explosion," he continued, his voice soothingly calm and eerily distant. "We found remains of equipment, cages, and chemicals we believe were used to hold and experiment on prisoners. Many died."

_Oh, good. I was hoping you weren't coming to cheer me up_, I thought.

"But three people survived. One is believed to be the Battista girl, the one currently in custody. We've already called to confirm the charges. Another is a woman from Russia, who was apparently taken because she used to work for the Battista family as a gardener. The third was the niece of the man who kept you there—she's currently in critical but recovering condition at a hospital in New York, but because we don't know for sure she was innocent to the happenings of the incident, we have her guarded to make sure she doesn't go anywhere before we can identify her."

"She won't go anywhere," the second and silent officer replied. "She can't."

The other officer looked at him sharply, then turned to me. His eyes had taken on a tone of apologetic indifference. He asked me several questions about Ashley, which I barely heard. I could think only of Ashley, a girl who had survived the almost-impossible. But his eyes took away all feelings of hope. With a quick look at my parents, as though asking if it was okay to tell me, he leaned forward.

His voice serious, like he was talking to a mature adult, he said, "He's right. Ashley may never move again. The explosion damaged multiple parts of her brain, spine, and legs. She's not conscious yet, but the doctors think, so far, that if she does regain consciousness, she may recover fully."

"With a lot of help from physiotherapy, and possibly surgery," the other added, but this time, the older officer didn't reprimand him. He was watching me, but nodded slightly.

_They came and gave me hope, and then they took it back_, I thought. _Ashley's alive, but she may never live life normally again, if she lives at all. I'm free, but this will probably haunt me for the rest of my life. Taking a week off of school isn't even going to help,_ I realized dismally. _And the only people who could ever really understand are either dead or too far away for me to reach at this exact second._

Mimi, Bobbi, and the mysterious hero-slash-killer who had rescued me. I wanted to ask the girl if it was worth it. If I'd been worth it. Because I was free, many had died—my rescuer included. Because of us, because of her, because of _me_, Ashley may never walk, talk, or breathe without the help of a machine. And although I could talk to Bobbi, I didn't want to dump this on her. Her sister was about to be prosecuted on charges too horrible to contemplate, although I'd lived through them myself. And Mimi was dead.

_So Bobbi was right. Although the ordeal seems to be over to everyone else, it'll never be over for us_.

To the people who saw the news, including my clients, it would be nothing more than last year's car crash. It wouldn't affect them, unless I decided not to baby-sit again, and even that was a very small effect in such a big, complicated situation. They wouldn't need therapy, as the police officers were now suggesting for me, and family members wouldn't stare at them because they were deep in a thoughtful daze.

"I want to see Ashley," I suddenly said, startling them all from their conversation and thoughts.

I knew I needed a shower. I knew my hair might never be free of the knots it had tangled into. I knew my clothes smelled like I'd spent several days sleeping in them—because I had. I'd changed when I got home after walking all day, but none of it mattered. I had to see Ashley and set the record straight. I had to talk to her before she died, because if she did…let's just say, I appreciated life and death a little more now.

Ashley had risked everything to talk to me, to help me—and she'd ended up worse off than I'd been. I had to thank her. To apologize. To make up. To wish her a quick recovery. If she could hear me in her coma, or whatever state she was in now, she had to hear me. I had to say these things to her—they wouldn't mean much to anyone else.

* * *

It took some time to convince them all that I really had to speak to Ashley, but the warning the one officer gave my parents (earning a sidelong glance from the other) when my parents finally agreed to my visit made me think about my decision. As I hurried up the stairs to shower and change (even though my parents wanted to get ready first, since I refused to sleep until I'd seen Ashley—time was important) I heard one of the officers tell my parents that Ashley was in very bad condition—that seeing her might shock me.

Despite the childish gesture, I crossed my fingers as I hurried through the contents of my dresser—I had to see Ashley. No matter how incapacitated she was.

I just hoped, that if she was conscious, she didn't see the look of horror I expected would be on my face.

* * *

**Author's Note: I know I said there'd only be another chapter or two, but this may have more than one more. I don't know yet how long this will take to end…**

**Anyway, here it is—the twentieth chapter! I've never had such a long story! (It's still incomplete, though.) Thanks to everyone who has reviewed! :D**


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21**

**POV: Dahlia**

When I was a child, I was used to perfection. My parents hired a gardener, and beautiful flowers and trimmed shrubs and colorful trees always surrounded our house. They hired servants, maids, and cooks—people to skim the pool, people to cook our meals, people to clean the house, and people to generally cater to our every whim. They could afford a life of nothingness filled with luxury—go to work, come home, go to work. Life was all about work. Life was nothing but posing for pictures and sitting perched in a lady-like manner. Life was boring. But people still envied us—we had our pictures in magazines; people came in to look at our house even though we had no plans to sell; and people generally exclaimed over every statue and fountain and electronic device we had.

I used to hate everything. I vowed to grow up and wear the most casual clothes I could find. After a life surrounded by priceless, authentic vases from the medieval times, and having to walk and whisper when I wanted to run and yell, I wanted nothing more than a life of simplicity.

More than anything, I wanted a family that didn't consist of two lawyers who were never home and a twin sister who would rather follow the rules, even if she hated posing for pictures and answering stupid questions, than break the rules and have fun.

When Mom cheated on Dad, I felt cheated, too—weren't we doing our very best to obey all the rules and never act or react? But then Kerry was born, which felt like a curse to me. It was more work, another face to deal with. And, six months later, Dad died.

I was only fourteen. I needed nothing more than the support of my family as I started into the usual changes girls of that age go through. I'd started my period; I'd been offered drugs; I'd been pressured to make out. Had I had someone to talk to, maybe I would have been able to say 'no' to more of those things. You can't actually say anything to your period, but you can answer when someone asks you or pressures you to give them 'just one kiss' or take 'just one sniff.' I didn't have anyone to talk to, though.

As I got older, the photo-shoots that had dominated almost every weekend of my life decreased. The only thing that really increased was my isolation—the seclusion I'd thought we had between interviews, since nobody ever bothered to talk to us otherwise, increased—and therefore, my freedom. Maybe the media was warned away by the guards—who had been told that the media would most likely want to use pictures of Bobbi and I for the stupid tabloids. But when they stopped hanging around the gates, I decided to go out. And I never stopped.

Shopping became an obsession. I'd previously never tasted things like chocolate or Pepsi or hamburgers—they were all forbidden. We only ate salads and carrot sticks and whatever gourmet food the cook made. Buying my own clothes—clothes without lace, frills, pleats, and padding—also came to be a great hobby. And socializing—that was a freedom all by itself. I'd been in a private school for years and hated it. I mostly didn't like how snobby the other students were. The boys were all arrogant jerks who only wanted sex and related things from girls, and all of the girls were prissy and wanted the boys to wait on them as if they were princesses.

So, of course, the real world beyond the borders created for us by wealthy parents was a shock. Watching uncensored TV, listening to music that wasn't made by some prissy teenaged pop star, and eating food that wasn't perfectly healthy were all treats to me.

And now, it was all gone. Taken away. Stolen.

It was a pathetic irony. I'd caged people, and now I was caged. My life had been so full of restrictions that the freedom had been like being sprung from a hot, dark, stuffy cannon into a cool, brilliant, refreshing rainstorm. And now, I was back in the cannon. Back in a place with restrictions all around. I couldn't eat what I wanted. I couldn't move. I couldn't talk—nobody would hear me. I couldn't sleep or use the toilet in peace. I couldn't talk on the phone. I couldn't even change my clothes.

And I didn't care. The only thing I could really think about was Bobbi. _Her_ life had been full of restrictions, too, and until I'd been put back into a cage after tasting freedom, I hadn't ever stopped to consider her or her feelings. She'd been fourteen, too, when Dad died. She felt the same betrayal and grief I had then, and when Mom confessed to cheating. She'd gone through the same monotonous interviews and started her period at the same time I had. The only difference was that she'd been strong enough to be strong for a child through all of that. To be strong for any child is a chore. To practically slave over the child your mother made with a man she met at a bar one night would be like actual slave work, mentally. I was actually surprised the tabloids hadn't come to us about it yet—'Battista Sex Scandal Revealed!'

Of course, I didn't just feel sorry for Bobbi. I couldn't help but feel betrayed by her. She was my twin. She should have felt the same way I did, and done what I had. At least then she would be sitting here, in a plain gray cell with the blinding white light from a barred window the only thing to look at aside from the flaked paint brushed sloppily across the cement walls and steel bars. At least then I could talk to her—something I'd started trying to convince myself would never happen. If you can reject the idea of something right at the beginning, it hurts a lot less when it doesn't happen.

Since there wasn't much to do, I tried to imagine the news reports. I'd seen Claudia's disappearance mentioned—and I was in custody shortly after she returned. But what other reports might there be? I'd been on my way out when the fortress exploded, so I wasn't injured. Actually, I'd gotten a bruise from when the first blast sent me into a wall and the momentum carried me down to the concrete at an angle, but nobody holding me here had questioned it.

Considering the power of the explosion, I knew I was lucky. I could only imagine Wyeth's mansion now—mangled metal; crushed cages; flaked paint; bent bars; scorched window, door, and picture frames; destroyed valuables—the torture devices he'd salvaged from scrap heaps after wars in other countries, mainly.

And the prisoners—I doubted any survived. Claudia had, I knew for a fact. Had Bobbi been there, as she should have been, she would be dead. I know that, because had she been working on our side, she would have been a technician, or possibly a chemist—fixing the computers, repairing electronics, and formulating the various drugs we used on the prisoners. There were many—some we forced into addiction on common street drugs; others we fed and forced, with a medicine, to retain it all for hours, no matter what they ate. And the other drugs, the illegal concoctions made specifically for the prisoners with medical problems or bad tempers, were worse. Bobbi, considering her mental attitude, might have been a great chemist.

It was hard to imagine anyone else surviving. The girl Claudia escaped with was most likely dead—I'd anticipated her escape and ensured that she took the one drug designed for a fairly fast, but somewhat painful, death. One less witness for us to deal with later.

I'd read up on torture subjects as a teenager. Just like now, I had plenty of time. In any case, my first thought as I scrolled through pages and pages of online discussions, findings, and discoveries on ancient and current legal methods was that the human race was a horrifying and disgusting one.

Later, when I was spending more and more time alone because nobody else was interested in my life, or me, I became almost fascinated with the atrocities. I knew it was morbid and morally wrong, but I spent a lot of time thinking about them—fascinating about the various methods I'd memorized and kept notes on and the different people who I thought should be hurt. I even assigned certain methods to each person.

My biggest regret wasn't agreeing to help Wyeth in his schemes, since he paid me and I got to use some of the information I'd studied—it was that I hadn't known Claudia sooner so I could have used her in my twisted fantasies and assigned several other methods to her name. Showing her what we'd done with her friend had been enough for her, it seemed, but still, water-boarding the girl might have been just as satisfying.

Sick. I knew I was sick. I knew I was evil. But it never stopped—the fantasies, the knowledge I'd gained, the hyper satisfaction that pumped my blood and tickled my stomach with a rush of cool, tingling adrenaline when I thought about them or discovered a new one. I wanted to stop them, somehow—once, in desperation, I'd even told my mother. She looked at my solemn face, heard my serious voice—and I'm sure she saw in my eyes that I was telling her the truth. I proved it, reciting just three of the hundreds of techniques I'd learned, leaving out the ones I created myself and was still perfecting. But she laughed. Now, I'm sure, now that a castle sits in scorched ruins and hundreds of people died, she believes me. I'm sure she does, or I wouldn't still be sitting in this cell. I'm sure she's been interviewed for the TV stations. At last, our family is back in the spotlight. Maybe she wants to free me. Maybe she believes me.

Maybe she doesn't. Maybe she thinks all of this is crazy, that I'm not really behind bars. She probably thinks this is a dream—a long one, since I don't know how long I'v been in here; time is one thing I have plenty of and am deprived of all at once—she'll wake up from and Kerry will nothing more than the lingering thought of another man; Dad will return from work; Bobbi still attends gymnastics classes; and I will be just as naïve and innocent as she wanted.

Or, a more likely thought, she doesn't care. After all, I may have been locked up here only several days—I think, since the window had been dark only about five times—but she's never come to see me, to talk, to tell me what's happening beyond the bars.

I'm sure Bobbi won't, either. Mom will go to work, Bobbi will raise Kerry, and I will probably rot here, eating prison food and using a toilet that doesn't have so much as a single thin curtain around it.

I can't imagine what the survivors look like. I know what they might look like after controlled torture—but having never witnessed an explosion in person, I suddenly realized that I can't really imagine what they might look like—mangled, scorched limbs with ends missing; stringy, burned hair; skin gray with lack of nutrients and ashen with debris of the flames. I imagine blood.

But I've never actually seen it. And I know how sick it is, but I want to.

_You must belong here_, I finally told myself, during another night of insomnia. Insomnia is bad enough in your own bed, surrounded by your own things. But it's worse when your bed is basically a cold steel rack covered in scratchy wax paper bolted to a wall and your room is four feet squared and you can't leave—not for a drink of water, not for a midnight snack, not even to answer the phone that keeps ringing somewhere and awakening the prisoners lucky enough to sleep.

_Belong here?_ The idea jumped up from its place in my mind and seemed to slap me. I actually flinched. Anyone watching—the girl in the cell across from me and I were the only ones who could see each other, since the cells were individual for newer captives and had thicker walls between each—would probably think a bug landed on me.

Bugs. That was a big problem here, apparently. They were tiny, ugly, cockroach-style things with wings and too many legs. Considering the wet atmosphere of the chilly, partially-underground holding facility, I was surprised we didn't also have rats.

Not that I was hoping for rats.

_To think a Battista could sink to this_. It was something my mother had said, and it popped into my head as I surveyed my cell again. There wasn't much to see—which was exactly why it was suddenly a fact I couldn't ignore. I'd grown up eating gourmet food, wearing jewels, sleeping in silk, and being able to call up any help I needed at the press of a button should I decide to spend the whole day curled up in bed.

Here, I was wearing a hideously bright orange prison suit with two horizontal white stripes on my chest to match the set of stripes on each arm and leg of the uniform. I was eating what was probably chicken and potatoes and corn but was so dry and without flavor that it was hard to tell. I was given a glass of cold water with each meal and allowed more when I could yell loud enough to be heard through the doors. (They could probably hear us yelling, but were ignoring us most of the time.) So, most of the time, we all remained silent. I wasn't allowed to wear any jewelry or makeup, and jail apparently didn't serve any kind of dessert, but, at least, I had a toilet (even if it wasn't private; a silent understanding between cells facing each other was that snapping your fingers twice indicated that the person facing you had to turn to face the wall until you heard the other person snap twice again) and was allowed a short walk each day down to the bathrooms for a semi-private shower. At least female guards, not male guards, watched each stall. And I was situated in the women's wing; no males.

Suddenly, thinking of all I had and had taken for granted and hated, I missed my freedom. I missed my mother, my sister—even Kerry. I missed my silk pajamas and designer cargo pants and my bedroom, and especially my bed.

I heard two loud snaps echo through the room, and as if we were all plugged into the same machine, those of us who were awake rolled over to face the wall.

I doubted it mattered if we rolled over at night—the cells were so dark, the only light coming from a single bare bulb at the end of the hall, that I could barely see the bars just four feet away from me.

I stood up after hearing the second set of snapping fingers and leaned against the cold wall over my steel bed. The window couldn't have been more than six inches from the ground, but at least it faced more than a brick wall, as the cell across from me did. (I didn't know the girl caged across from me. Nobody spoke in here aside from through our fingers, and to yell for water.) My window, although only three or four inches tall and maybe eight inches wide, gave me a view of the stars twinkling in a hazy sky, the mountain almost completely cloaked in clouds, and the hard grass rolling down to the electric fence topped with barbed wire that would have meant freedom if not for the guards and raging river beyond, ten feet below.

I lay back down quickly when the door opened at the end of the hall, sweeping light into our dusty confinement. It was time for the guards to make sure we were all still here, and I didn't know what they'd do if they caught someone looking out the window. It wasn't like I could do anything—the window was tiny and covered in thick bars—but I kept my features neutral and didn't even flinch when the bright beam from a flashlight hit my face and remained there for longer than necessary. The routine, bi-hourly checks woke those who slept, and those who slept through it were probably exhausted from previous sleepless nights.

That was another irony. The torture methods I'd used (the mild ones, anyway) were similar to these. Waking prisoners often to deprive them of sleep (of course, the ones I'd used it one hadn't had the option of facing a wall, since they were all chained in one way) was a pretty simple and effective one. But here, they were legal—and in fact, expected. It wasn't even considered torture.

When the beam flashed away and continued down the hall, I opened my eyes and glanced around again. My eyes now had to readjust to the dark, and I swatted a moth that was buzzing me. I hoped it was a moth, anyway—if it was another spider, I doubted I'd be able to contain the scream I'd been suppressing since the first arachnid landed on me. But there wasn't much to see, so again, I closed my eyes.

Yelling ensued.

I kept my eyes closed, but by the sounds of it, one of the prisoner cells was empty. Someone here was gone—and since I hadn't seen anyone walk by my cell since the guards had shoved a tin tray at me at supper, I guessed the escapee had either managed to squeeze through the tiny window or had dug through the cement—or, of course, managed to open her lock and get out through the door, which seemed unlikely. Not only was the hall with our barred doors monitored, but guards were everywhere.

Good. It was time to escape. I hadn't done much worse than they had, except that they'd been paid for it (in money that wasn't considered stolen) and anyway, I had unfinished business beyond the cell.

I'd spent just as much time learning escape tactics as I had tactics on surviving isolation. I'd never been trained, of course, but it didn't matter. I'd practiced. I didn't doubt I would escape my cell—I'd just needed a distraction, and the missing prisoner three cells away from mine would be perfect.

I had about thirteen seconds before the prison was in full lockdown.

* * *

**Author's Note: The chaos of post-moving insanity and computer issues delayed me from writing this. However, to make up for it, I really want to write and post the next chapter tomorrow, telling Claudia's story from where I left off. She was just about to leave to see Ashley, and I think it'll be an interesting chapter. This one was hard to write! :P**


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22  
**

I hurried to wrap myself in the warm towels before the cold shivers could hit me. Getting out of a hot bath and back into the chilly winter air, even when the heater is turned almost all the way up isn't fun—no matter how hot the air seems while you're sitting in the bath, it seems much colder when you get out. But instead of hurrying to put on the clean clothes I'd picked out, I sat on the edge of the bathtub and sighed.

I knew seconds counted—any minute now, Ashley could die and I'd never speak to her again. But as much as I knew I had to see her, and thank her, I didn't really want to see her. It was selfish to just sit here when she was out there, injured and possibly dying, but a little part of me felt I'd seen and done enough. It was that little part of me that kept me still on the side of the tub, enjoying the soft warmth of the towels and water droplets running down my skin.

Finally, I crushed the persistent and pessimistic part of my mind and got dressed, running first a towel and then a hairbrush over my head. I ignored the water droplets falling from my hair as I rushed to grab my wallet from my room. (With most of the things I'd given up over the previous few months, a purse was among the least important.) I was in the car before either of my parents or my sister (who had insisted on coming) was.

Our first stop was Bobbi's. After all we'd been through, my parents understood that I wasn't about to leave the city without telling her where I would be—she might think I'd been kidnapped again or something.

I stared silently out the window and ignored the tense silence building in the car. I was glad my mother didn't try to warn me about the things I might see—just as I was glad my father didn't start asking Janine any questions about her current physics lessons. Janine, of course, didn't say a single thing until we'd reached Bobbi's, at which point she allowed a tiny gasp of admiration to escape her plain, academic appearance.

Bobbi's house was pretty incredible, and I couldn't say the appearance of the place was why I suddenly felt so much better. Well, it was, but not because of the clean, fancy beauty. It was because Bobbi's head was visible at the front door, over a sea of parked cars.

"Why are there so many cars here?" Mom asked in annoyance from the driver's seat. I saw my father glance at her, eyes dark, and before either of them could speak, I threw open my door and tore along the circular driveway. Bobbi and I met with a hug on the front porch.

"Relatives," Bobbi explained. "They all came to see us when they heard about Dahlia. Familial support," she added, with a shrug. "Are you going somewhere?"

"Yes," I answered, and I explained the situation with Ashley. Bobbi's face grew sober.

"I'd go with you," she began, sounding sad, "but as Dahlia's twin, I'm not sure it'd be a good idea. People say we look alike, and I don't want to be the cause of a painful flashback. It would be cruel for me to be there, kind of...I don't know, hypocritical."

"I understand," I said, deciding against mentioning that Ashley was comatose and that Bobbi was nothing at all like her twin sister was. Kerry had taken Bobbi's hand while she was speaking, and had rested her head against Bobbi's leg and smiled sleepily at me. I'd had to talk to her after I returned from my ordeal (that night at my house and the afternoon over the sundaes at the soda shop had been a good cure for all of her worries)

Bobbi nodded, and picked Kerry up. "Well, good luck, Claudia. Maybe the four of us can get together sometime soon." Seeing my confused expression, she smiled slightly. "Ashley, Kerry, you, and I," she explained. "I never leave Kerry alone, and if ever I was to meet Ashley, I'm sure she'd appreciate the support of a real friend."

* * *

On the longer drive to New York, I pretended to fall asleep. I didn't want to deal with the tense silence. I really wanted to think—about everything that had happened in my life starting from the December night I'd been hurrying to Bobbi's house to watch Kerry for the very first time, up until now, when I was on my way to see someone who was possibly dying but possibly recovering. And I was nervous.

I felt horrible about feeling so sorry for myself when clearly, things could have been so much worse. I wasn't lying in a coma in a hospital bed, facing a life of possible paralysis if ever I did wake up. So, although Ashley may or may not hear what I wanted to tell her, I knew I had to say it all just right. And I definitely didn't want to offend her—she was in a bad enough condition.

When we saw the lights glittering on the horizon of the New York City skyline, I pretended to wake up and realize where we were. When we reached the hospital, I was the first one out of the car and inside the first building, which was where most of the seven-building hospital paperwork was done and kept. It was also where a woman with a stiff bun on her head sat behind a big, polished wooden desk would tell me which room Ashley Wyeth was lying in.

My father stepped up to the desk, the first to reach my side since I left the car. "Four visitors for Ashley Wyeth," he announced.

"Visiting hours are over," the woman replied, her tone bored and unfeeling.

I stepped up to the desk. She looked up, slightly daunted, but when she saw me, her eyes widened until I was sure she'd have to have one of the doctors put them back in.

"The girl from the news!" she marvelled, as if she'd never before met someone so strange.

"Yes, and the Wyeth girl happens to be involved. She may also be dying, and I have to see her. Now," I added firmly, hoping she wouldn't jump up and ask for an autograph or something. She looked like the kind of person who might stalk a celebrity and collect a piece of trash they threw out, or a bread crust they had bitten most of the bread from.

"Yes, ma'am," the woman said, and jumped up to lead me to Ashley herself. Over her shoulder, a watching desk attendant hurried to fill the woman's vacated swivel chair.

"Take this elevator up to the third floor," the woman directed, "and Ashley is in Room 462. But don't stay long. Her family hasn't been here to see her yet, and if other families see you here, they'll ignore the rules and—"

Ignoring the woman, we piled into the elevator. I found myself wishing that the elevator would be slow. As much as I felt I had to see Ashley, I wanted to delay it. I had to talk to her before—and if—she died. But what if she felt she could die after she and I spoke? What if that was the only reason she was hanging on?

As though a hospital angel heard me, the elevator was slow. And, just when we'd reached the second floor, the elevator stopped to let a nurse pushing a wheelchair on, and then the elevator went back to the first floor. By the time we reached Ashley's floor, two more nurses had gotten on, and a woman who seemed unable to stand straight pushed a pole with a heavy IV bag on it into the elevator and had to go up to the eighth floor.

We sidestepped another nurse pushing a gurney with a sleeping patient under a thin white sheet on it into the elevator on Ashley's floor, and I couldn't help but check and make sure the girl on the rolling bed wasn't someone I knew. I hate hospitals. The girl wasn't Ashley, but she was crying quietly and looked humiliated. I averted my eyes and kept walking.

Outside of the cold gray metal door with Ashley's number on it (and her name on the thick sheaf of paper in the clipboard beside it) I froze. I felt like my feet had been glued to the polished fake-marble floor. I could feel the eyes of my mother on me, and I knew that if I didn't move, she would stroke my arm and tell me I didn't have to go in, that everything would be okay no matter what I did. But I couldn't let anything stop me—not thoughts of comfort, not thoughts of avoidance—or optimistic thoughts of good luck. I had been through a lot by myself, and this was one of the things I would have to do on my own, or not at all.

So, before she could step forward or murmur my name, I grabbed the door handle and stepped inside, flattening myself against the wall and letting the door swing shut beside me. Aside from the rectangle window in the door with the mesh across the clear glass, the only light in the room came from a pair of flickering fluorescent lights, not unlike the ones in the cages, on the bottom of the shelf over the head of Ashley's stabilized gurney bed. The shelf held little IV bags and a stack of the thick cardboard barf-tubs. Ashley, seemingly oblivious to my entry, didn't move. I shivered. This hospital was cold and quiet. Like the cages. But worse, as though people didn't speak here simply because they couldn't.

For a moment that seemed to stretch endlessly, I stood in the doorway with most of my weight on one leg and my thumbs hooked into the back pockets of my jeans as I watched the bed for a sign of movement. But there was nothing—not a blink, not a twitch, not a breath.

I stepped closer, cautious, as though she might sit up and yell, "Boo!"

I pulled up a plastic chair beside her bed and stared for a moment at her face. It could have been the light, but she looked shockingly pale. White bandages were wrapped around her head, and despite it having been six days since our ordeal, she looked terrible. _And her family hasn't even been here to see her yet_, I thought, recalling the receptionist's words.

Where should I start? There was so much to say, and I felt a little lost. I wanted to apologize, recalling Bobbi's words about true friends. I wanted to thank her, thinking about how she'd risked herself to help me. I wanted to yell and cry, too—she and I had fought once over something that had once been so important and now seemed so stupid, and yet she had been there with me when people who really should have been weren't.

I expected Mom to poke her head in and ruin the tense, welcome silence of the room by telling me it was time to go or that they'd be in the cafeteria. I knew this hospital fairly well. Stacey had been here plenty of times when her diabetes had been acting up. But she didn't. The few seconds of silence stretched into minutes.

A weak cough startled me out of my thoughtful trance, and I looked up in time to see Ashley's eyes widen in fear as she struggled to sit up, to talk—and, seeing me, reach out.

Another coughing fit ensued, and I ran to the door and yelled for a nurse to bring water. One did, quite quickly (I guess patients of the serious units like the explosion/burn unit are treated a little more quickly than other patients) and I sat down and watched as the nurse supported Ashley's head and helped her to sip at the water. Mom hovered in the doorway, watching, and I knew by the look of concern evident on her face that she was getting ready to tell me it was time to go, that Ashley should rest and that I would be in the way.

The nurse set the half-empty paper cup on the bedside table, raised the head of Ashley's bed, and guided Mom out of the room, the door closing with a soft click behind them.

Ashley's eyes had calmed when she started drinking, but she looked at me and I saw an array of emotion in her eyes so vivid that I doubted any artist could ever capture it all. So, with both of us seeming unsure of what to say or how to say it, we sat in silence.

"I thought you were dead," Ashley finally muttered. "They took me down to the arsenal just before the explosion. I think they might have known it was going to happen."

"Maybe," I allowed, but I could tell that neither of us was ready to talk about that. Not yet.

I had tried to write a speech in the days I'd spent in bed, but I could do nothing but hand it to her. She tried to take it with her left arm, but winced and tried again with her right arm.

"Are you in pain?" I asked her, and she looked up at me. Then, as if she'd just realized something important, she lifted the thin white sheet covering her from the chest down.

She and I gasped in unison. I knew I'd been right to feel bad about feeling as bad as I'd felt, but I suddenly felt very wrong about having asked her how she felt.

Her right leg looked mutilated. What wasn't bandaged and bloody was braced with a plastic contraption. Bloodied stitches seemed to be all that held her calf together. Her leg seemed twisted unnaturally, but it was the angle of her foot that freaked me out more than anything. Her left leg looked slightly better, but a cast covered the lower half of her thigh and most of her calf. The exposed flesh was discoloured and swollen. Her left arm lay limply at her side, and twitches I recognized as involuntary seemed to me the only movement it was capable of. Her right arm seemed fine, but a thick bandage around her right shoulder seemed to make moving it a chore. This, combined with the bandage on her head and the big, square Band-Aid patches on her chest, visible through her flimsy, papery nightgown, made for a horrifying sight. She smelled of smoke, and smudges of black and red indicated that she hadn't yet been able to bathe.

"It doesn't look good for me," Ashley said, trying to sound sarcastic but sounding about to burst into tears. I remembered what Dahlia had shown me, told me—and I suddenly felt very close and oddly detached at once to/from her. She'd been through hell because of me.

I didn't know what to say. I felt horrible. So I sat down again, and took her hand. Sitting on her left, her left hand in mine, I could feel that her hand was cold and limp—stiff from its long hours flattened onto the bed at Ashley's side. Cuts crisscrossed her wrist and forearm, but her hand seemed fine. I squirted some hand sanitizer into my palm and started massaging it into her hand, and she sighed in something that sounded like forced happiness—as though she still felt like crying but appreciated my attempts at making her feel better. I did the same to her other hand, this one able to grip me back. Long after the hand sanitizer had dried, I remained sitting on the right side of her bed in another uncomfortable chair and held her hand.

After a while, we started talking—slowly at first, and then, as the silence became less of an enemy and more of a temporary time for thinking, with more haste and urgency as things we had to say seemed to be spoken by two mouths instead of one. We interrupted each other, spoke in unison, and cried a few times, but it was one of the best conversations I'd ever had. I used to love saying 'Jinx,' when my friends and I spoke at the same time, and I used to avoid crying and interrupting whenever I could, but when Ashley and I fell silent, I felt closer to her than ever.

Still massaging her hand, I suddenly realized we'd stopped talking and that she looked as sleepy as I felt.

"Did you come because you heard I was out of my coma?" she asked.

"Actually, I didn't know you were out of your coma. I just got the news a few hours ago that you were alive. We came straight here."

Her eyes sparkled. "Will you come back? I'm sure I won't be out of here for a while yet..." The thought of staying alone in here now that she was awake seemed frightening, and I nodded. Yes, I would come back—every chance I got, and even when I didn't have the chance.

Ashley kept talking until she trailed off, and I smiled sleepily, half-asleep myself with my head on the bed beside her. I slipped my hand out of hers, returned the weak squeeze I felt just as my fingers slipped out of her grasp, and moved silently to the door. Despite my effort, Ashley opened her eyes and called, her voice slightly dry, "Have a safe trip home, Claudia. And thank you for coming. Um, can you flag a nurse? I'm still thirsty."

I helped her drink the last of the water, flagged a nurse to go in and check on Ashley and make sure she was okay and had enough to drink while I was gone, and then, stumbling, I flung myself into the car and fell asleep before my parents had even closed their doors.

* * *

I was happy to wake up the next morning (in my own bed, though I don't remember how I ended up there) to the ringing of my bedside phone. The caller was Ashley, calling to ask if I was coming in (and whether my first visit with her had been real) and to tell me that the police would be in that afternoon to question her.

We spoke for quite a while before Ashley started sounding sleepy again, so we hung up. Almost immediately, the phone rang again. This time, I answered a little cautiously.

"Claudia?" Bobbi's voice sounded tense, and instantly, my guard went up. Bobbi didn't sound tense without reason, so something was wrong. "Did I wake you?"

"No," I answered. "What's wrong?"

Bobbi didn't waste time with words. "Dahlia escaped from jail last night."

"What?"

Bobbi knew I'd heard her, and didn't repeat herself. "Knowing her, and how resourceful she is, she probably saw the cell—the ones where alleged offenders await trial—as a challenge. A game. She's gone, and she may be anywhere. I've sent a squad car to you, and the officers will make sure you're okay until she's caught. But Dahlia is on the loose, so we'll both have to be very, _very _careful."

I shivered—but this shiver had nothing to do with the temperature of my room.

* * *

**Author's Note: Computer crashed twice while writing this. This is the second-and-a-half rewrite. I lost the first completely and managed to save this second one—barely... :(  
So if anything in this chapter seems to be missing or out of place or anything, let me know, please... :)**


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23**

"You scared me," Mom muttered, stumbling into the kitchen and heading for the coffee pot. The flashing, glowing digital numbers read that it was just four minutes after three A.M., and although I could have pointed out that _she'd_ scared _me_, I didn't.

"Did you hear strange noises, too?" I asked, when I'd swallowed the mouthful of Lucky Charms cereal I'd almost choked on when the kitchen light flickered to life. (Why did all lights seem so weak lately?)

"Yes," Mom said, "but I figured when I saw you that the noises I heard had been you. I wasn't even going to mention them. What kind of noises did you hear?"

"Kind of a rattling sound, like someone on the roof was playing with the shutters or something."

"Those shutters are bolted to the siding. Just decoration," Mom yawned. "Maybe it was someone breaking in—"

She froze, eyes wide. She and I used to joke a lot about people who might break in despite the shabby appearance houses in our neighborhood take on in the misty midst of winter. Now, it didn't seem so funny.

"What's going on?" Dad asked from the kitchen doorway, looking a little sheepish when both Mom and I flinched at the sound of his voice. I guess we were a little on edge. He joined us at the table, stopping only for a cup of coffee. "Did you hear something, too?"

"There's an officer outside," Mom replied. "Maybe we should ask if he's seen anything."  
So my father put on his boots and threw his parka over his flannel pajamas. When he came back, he was shaking his head. "He didn't see anything. Or hear anything," he added. "Maybe we're paranoid."

"Maybe?" Mom muttered, but silenced herself when she glanced at me. The potential fight was headed off when Janine joined us, and she and Dad started into one of their conversations revolving around advanced trigonometry or whatever it was she was learning.

By Wednesday morning, which was really just the same day as it had been during our three A.M. midnight snack, I had managed to sleep for about seven hours—four before three A.M. and another three between three-thirty and eight. Not the best sleep I'd ever had, but since I was still out of school (though Emily had stopped by to bring me the homework assignments and explain them to me) I wasn't worried. I'd nap if I had to.

I planned on going to school on Thursday and Friday, though. Staying at home wasn't doing me much good, and I wanted to talk to Jason Ceralle. He had invited me to the Valentine's Day Dance, and now, that dance was only a day or two away. Friday was the big day, and I hadn't seen, much less spoken to, my date at all.

I had to wait through Wednesday—a day of eating, sleeping, and watching bad daytime TV to pass the time—before I could talk to anyone, though. So, by Thursday, I was actually eager to go to school. I got up early (at least I slept) and showered. I did my makeup, dressed, and ate breakfast at the table—something I hadn't really done since before my kidnapping.

Jason seemed to be waiting for me. Kids I barely knew greeted me as I entered the school—they all seemed to know me now that I'd had my face on TV. The principal welcomed me back over the PA system, and my math teacher served cupcakes to the class. All this fuss over a girl who had supposedly been missing—and the real details hadn't yet been revealed to the public, mostly because the two victims still in America—the Russian gardener had flown home to be with her family—were only fourteen years old.

The last thing Ashley or I needed was for a camera and microphone to be thrust into our faces right now. Flashbacks of our return from the island and the big fight over School Spirit Month came back as I thought of the two short and simple interviews I'd done, unable to answer the questions that danced dangerously close to the truth.

Jason and I didn't get to talk until lunchtime, but that didn't really bother me. He was all smiles, so I was pretty sure he wasn't going to tell me he'd found another girl to take to the dance. And he didn't. He wanted to ask me what color my dress was so we wouldn't clash.

"Um…black and red," I said, although I hadn't actually gotten a dress yet. In the chaos of the past two weeks, I hadn't had much time for thinking about boys, shopping, or dances. But that was at least one problem I could solve easily—I could make my own dress, or combine two different things I found at a thrift store or something if I found a nice combination.

"Perfect," was Jason's reply. "Do you want to go out after school today?"

I was about to say "No," and make up an excuse when I stopped myself. With all the stress I'd been under, a little break from the house would be nice. And time away from people involved in the chaos of the past two months—considering parental arguments, child-abuse allegations, and torture—would be wonderful.

"Yes, that sounds great," I replied, and Jason's grin widened. He was _so_ cute!

"Great!" He waved and hurried to join a group of his friends at another table—leaving room for Cassandra Tuelle to sit beside me and drill be about myself—my disappearance, my interest in Jason, my lunch. (She's one of the Cokie Mason girls—smug and kind of snobby, but overly interested in you just because it makes for good gossip, so you can never really feel sorry for her.) I ate quickly, was as polite to Cassandra as I could manage to be, and spent the rest of the lunch period in the library catching up on the homework I'd missed during my 'vacation,' as students who thought I'd faked my disappearance for attention kept saying.

After school, I called Mom to make sure she knew I would be out with friends—and I didn't imagine the sigh of relief I heard on her end of the phone. Or was it a moan—an unfamiliar man's voice? Mom didn't hesitate to okay my plans, so I decided to count myself lucky. Still, I couldn't help but wonder as Jason paid my fare (and his) so we could take a bus to Pizza Express whether or not my mother was cheating on my father—and since I'd called her cellular phone, there was no way to tell where she'd been, or who she might have been with.

_Maybe she was just worried you would never get back to normal—hanging with friends and going out_, my mind suggested, and since Jason was now looking at me as though I'd just sprouted a second tongue, I decided to forget about it end enjoy the outing. A hot, cheesy pizza would be exactly what I needed to take my mind off of things.

"Did you say something?" I asked, when Jason continued to stare at me.

"Yes. I asked whether or not you wanted to see a movie tonight," he replied.

"Um…well, sure," I replied, and the resulting smile looked a little less enthusiastic. In fact, it was almost as if I'd just told him I never wanted to see him again.

"Something's wrong, isn't it?" he asked.

"No, not really. I mean, I don't think anything's wrong," I replied.

The pizza was a great distraction, and halfway through, his mobile phone rang. He frowned into it, but didn't speak. When he hung up, I couldn't resist asking who had called.

"Nobody," he said, but he didn't sound like he believed it. "Nobody was there."

I shrugged it off—until Jason added, "Oh, but I just remembered…I can't go out tonight. I have to watch my little cousins while my parents and my aunt and uncle go to the silent auction for my grandfather's belongings."

I shrugged and nodded. It didn't bother me as much as it might have in the past. Then again, all of this seemed a lot less exciting than dates had been in the past, too. He didn't seem to notice the lack of emotion in my response, and when we left for home, he didn't even remember to say good-bye or remind me that the dance started at seven P.M. the next night.

Because I'd eaten out, I passed up the steaming bowl of chili my father made. If either of my parents shot a concerned glance at the other, I didn't see it. I had to answer my phone, which was ringing in my room. My spine had started to tingle when I heard the ringing, and I was wondering if it might be a reporter. (They'd been calling so often on the landline that my sister disconnected it.)

"Claudia?" Bobbi's voice sounded calm, and I wished I was psychic. Had they found Dahlia? Was Kerry okay?

"It's me," I said, resisting the urge to tell her to hurry up and tell me what was going on.

"Good. This call is serious," she added. "Do you know someone named Jason Ceralle?"

"Yes," I answered slowly, unsure of what she was getting at.

"I hate to tell you this, but you can't trust him," Bobbi told me, sounding apologetic and almost angry. "The officer watching after you followed you, and traced the call he got when the two of you were having pizza. The call came from Wyeth—and it sounds a lot like he hired Jason to get close to you."

I wanted to slam the receiver down. After everything that had happened, why did one of the few good things turn out to be a trap? It sounded so far-fetched, and yet, because of the last two months of my life, totally believable. I wished suddenly that my life had remained boring, instead of exciting and adventurous as I had often wished. My stomach burned.

"Wyeth is alive," Bobbi repeated, and this time, it sunk in.

"What? But how? He should be dead!" My response was shrill, but I kept it as quiet as I could. Even so, I thought I could hear the conversation from the kitchen pause as I spoke.

"I don't know. The police have traced the call and are working on pinpointing the location. They think Dahlia might be with him, and they want them both alive."

How strange it must be, I thought, to have to speak about your sister as a fugitive.

"Okay," I said, although I was still angry about Jason being a traitor. "I guess that means our date is cancelled."

"Not necessarily. If the police can't catch him, they may want to use you as bait to lure him back—because if Wyeth remembers you, he'll want all of his agents after you."

"What about Ashley? She's alone in New York!"

"I've already sent several officers over to stay with her," Bobbi replied, and the thought of someone not more than three years older than me sending officers from one place to another was almost funny. "I know she, as someone a little weaker right now, is just as much a target for him as you are, if not more."

"What about the Russian woman? And the other people Wyeth threatened to hurt?"

"We just have to trust that they'll be okay until Wyeth and Dahlia are caught and jailed," Bobbi replied, "and that this time, neither can break free. That explosion should have killed them both, and that cell should have been able to hold Dahlia. But neither did."

"Okay," I repeated, but I felt a little less sure of myself than I hoped I sounded. Bobbi and I spoke a little more about Jason, and she ended the conversation with three simple words that should have been clear to me by now: _trust no one_.

* * *

A month or two ago, I would have called Emily to tell her all about the latest happenings—not which celebrity farted or burned her tongue, or who had the newest designer bag, but what had happened at my job with Kerry and how Bobbi had acted. We weren't fighting, but I didn't feel that I had anything to say to her. It was a strange feeling; I had no grudge against her, but I didn't want to talk to her. She hadn't been involved, and I didn't want her to be. It put her in danger, and Wyeth already knew her name and enough about her to threaten me with her safety. And she had no idea what I'd been through, so in a way, she was a part of my past.

A recent part, but a part of the past nonetheless.

So I hung up, curled up, and pulled a box of Oreo cookies out from behind my nightstand and finished my homework, which I'd started right after coming home from the pizza restaurant. I hurried through it (algebra was easier than it had been before) so I could turn my thoughts to the cookies and the would-be potential boyfriend who was working with a man I hated (with good reason) more than I'd hated anything before.

"Claudia? Weren't you hungry, honey?"

I didn't have to look up to know who it was. Despite sounding a lot like my mother, Janine would never call me 'honey,' and my father leaves dealing with potential problems to my mother, at least when it comes to girl issues.

"No. My phone was ringing, and I had homework to do." I didn't really want to tell my mother why Bobbi had called, but when I looked up, sensing that she was still there, the look of concern on her face made me rethink my decision. I pushed myself off of my elbows, sat up, and pulled my feet closer to me to make room for my mother. As always, she closed my door and joined me, as though we'd need special privacy and she planned to stay for a while.

"Bobbi just called," I explained. "She told me that the boy I like and was going to go with to the dance tomorrow night was working with Wyeth. He's alive," I added. I'd had to explain who everyone was and how they were involved a few times, but she understood now. It was clear by the concern evident in her eyes that she knew who I was talking about.

"Isn't it possible that Bobbi is jealous and just trying to make you back off so she can—"

"I trust Bobbi." I interrupted. She would never cheat me out of something, and she was too strong to sink to a level like that for a petty reason, especially using my ordeal and everyone related to it against me. But Mom didn't look convinced, so I decided against allowing the conversation to continue.

"Perhaps she's telling the truth," Mom agreed, seeing my expression, "but she might not be. You _did_ think she was abusive at one point."

"I just let Emily's imagination run away with me," I replied. "She was the one who was sure something was up with Bobbi, and there wasn't. She was cleared," I added, seeing Mom's expression becoming more and more annoyed with my insistence.

"Her sister was not," Mom pointed out, and I felt the hot spark of anger that had been burning since Bobbi told me Jason was working against me erupt as though it had been the fuse of a bomb.

"I spent enough time in her cages to know that!" I snapped, and the color drained out of my mother's face as she realized what she'd just said. I didn't wait for her response. I threw myself at my bedroom door and practically fell down the stairs, her voice following me until the front door slammed on my heels. But then, her voice continued on in my head. Why did she remind me of Dahlia's crimes? Because of her, Ashley and I would never be quite the same. I certainly didn't need a reminder of Dahlia's wrongdoings—I'd lived through the worst of them. Ashley's injuries were worse, but mine were about secondary only to hers.

I had left my wallet in my pocket when I'd come home earlier, so at least I had money. But where could I go? I could be attacked at any time, and it was getting dark. If one of Wyeth's hired helpers didn't catch me, a rapist or mugger might. Not that Stoneybrook had many of either, but I didn't want to meet any.

I walked past Kristy's old house, past Mary Anne's first house, past the house that she had lived in with Dawn and their newly-wed parents before it burned down, and past Stacey's, which faced Mallory's. I walked past Jessi's, past Logan's, and a little later, past Kristy's newer house, in the neighborhood where Shannon Kilbourne still lived.

I wasn't expecting to see anyone I knew. I hadn't really made any friends since the BSC broke up, but now it looked like I might never make another friend—it was too risky. Until Dahlia, Wyeth, and all of his minions were caught, I couldn't afford to trust anyone I didn't already.

_You really should have expected it,_ my mind told me. _You were in the cages long enough to see that humanity isn't all gold-hearts and honest citizens with good intent._

I stopped in front of Bobbi's, seven or eight houses away from Kristy's and just around the corner. Half of the cars that had been parked there on Tuesday were gone, but through the massive windows, I could still see that a lot of family members were still there. I sighed a little and kept walking, still unsure of where I was going. I'd walked past my former friend's houses mostly to distract myself from my mother's lingering words, and it had worked. Temporarily. I kept walking—I didn't want to think.

I got home just a few minutes past curfew, and prepared to face the wrath of my parents. I knew they were a little more nervous and a lot more paranoid with me since my disappearance, but I didn't expect my father, usually the one of us who can stay composed the longest, to rush over and hug me.

"Claudia, we have to talk," he said, when he released me. He led me to the living room, where I was sure I was about to get the lecture of a lifetime. Instead, he let me find a place to sit on my own, but not before I spotted my mother, sister, and the whole Battista family—minus Dahlia, of course—waiting for us.

"For our safety," Bobbi began, looking at my father as she spoke, "we've decided we're moving."

"You are?" I asked, and hoped she could understand what I was really asking. My unasked questions seemed to reach her, because she nodded and smiled.

Kerry looked up at me, eyes bright, and smiled. Bobbi, who was holding her on her lap, looked quickly at my father again before returning her gaze to mine.

"Yes. After everything that's happened, we decided that she will have to be moved to a more high-security prison just outside of Chicago."

"It'll be safer," Kerry added, but she glanced at her sister as she spoke, as if what she'd said needed confirmation. Bobbi nodded at her.

"And because we need a new start as well—things haven't been great for us over the last six or eight months, either—we'll be moving to Chicago, too." Mom added. "Your father and I—well, it was the one thing we could agree on."

I felt dizzy. This was big news, and it was happening fast.

"What about Ashley? And when is all this happening?"

"As a gift to you for sticking by us after everything that's happened," Bobbi's mother spoke up, for the first time, "we're paying a top-quality doctor to take over her care. And when she's able to return home…"

"We'll be taking her in as her legal guardians," my father added.

"So if they catch Dahlia—" I began, trying to make sense of it all.

"You don't know? They caught Dahlia half an hour ago!" Bobbi exclaimed. "Wyeth committed suicide when he found out we were tracking him down, and Dahlia surrendered herself and four of Wyeth's co-conspirators to the police when they told her surrendering would at least possibly remove the death penalty possibility."

"He's dead? She's locked up?" I was surprised—and shockingly emotional. Happy, sad, angry, nervous—I wasn't sure if I was feeling all of that or nothing at all.

"Yes…and it's time that we all make a fresh new start," Janine spoke up. "And leave the worst behind us."

* * *

**Author's Note: The next chapter **_**may**_** (or it may not) be the last, and it may be a flashback-type thing from the future. I don't really know yet. Opinions? :D**

**This chapter gave me a lot of trouble. First, wouldn't let me submit the thing, and then, MSN Messenger kept crashing when I tried sending it to an alternate computer. Oh, and about the surprise at the end-area of this chapter, I'd been planning that for a few days. It still seems rushed, though, at least to me...**


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24  
**  
**POV: Dahlia**

I have to admit, my escape from the temporary cell area was far easier than I'd anticipated. I was feeling quite proud as I bolted through the overgrown bush of the forest. I had to find Wyeth, and he could hide me until I had changed my identity. He has hundreds of fake identities and passports—I could start a life with a new name in a different country. I could be anyone. I could be safe.

The one place where Wyeth usually was—in his mansion—was empty. The mansion was actually registered to Charles Osborne, one of his alternate names. But I guessed that the police had caught up to Charles, because police tape surrounded the perimeter.

I tried not to feel discouraged, but it was hard. If the authorities had caught up to one of Wyeth's alternate names, it was possible that they knew some, of not all, of the other names he had, as well as the names he kept for people like me—people who worked for him. The names came with all of the necessary paperwork. In terms of fraud, Wyeth's mansion was one of the places most likely to be highlighted on the news when the evidence was found. Having been unable to see the News for several days, I could only imagine how big the story had gotten—most likely, it was a story blown out of proportion and shared with other networks.

Wyeth wasn't at his mansion. It was possible he was in custody—but he wasn't the type of person to allow anyone to catch up with him. He had probably kept an alternate identity with him and taken off—but there was one stop he would likely have to make before he could leave the country. He never went anywhere without his most-treasured gun, and he kept his heirloom gun in a log cabin up by the lake. It was a gun given to him by his father, who had gotten it from _his_ father. Needless to say, it was a gun he rarely used, but never left without.

As one of the only people allowed to work closely with him, I knew exactly where the cabin was. It was an old cabin, made almost entirely of fine, polished red wood inside and out, and surrounded by a clean lake, mountains, pine trees, and wild flowers. Exactly the kind of place nobody would suspect as being the ammunition cache for a worldwide terrorist—which was how the world would see him.

Of course, I didn't see him that way. To me, he was sexy and powerful and intelligent. He knew what he wanted out of life and had the means to get it. He could be anyone, do anything. He was special.

And he cared about me. While my family members were involved with their activities—cheating on my father, raising the product of her illicit, immoral intimacies, and ignoring her twin—he was taking care of me. His sister helped me understand a lot of what a girl's body went through during puberty. When I caught an infection, Wyeth was the one to take me, as his daughter, to a clinic. He paid for my medication. He even gave me a place to stay when I couldn't stand to stay at home any longer. He was not the uncaring person everyone else saw him as. He cared. He just didn't think it was right to dwell on emotion when there was still so much to be done—like conquering everyone too weak to matter to the way of the world. Thinking like that—'Survival of the fittest'—in a time when most people were seeing unity as power would make me seem just as uncaring as Wyeth seemed. But, of course, most people don't take the time to know me before they make such a judgment. They don't care. _They're_ the ones who are uncaring. They care so much about protecting the weak and expendable that they can't care about things that matter most in this world.

The cavemen advanced greatly because of one simple rule, one so basic and understood that it was never debated until people began to think of humanity as advanced—and we're so screwed up now that we may never completely be as pure as life was once. Humanity sickens me.

'Look out for number one.'

It means, look out for yourself. It's the best saying there ever was. If you don't look out for yourself, you die. And if you are too weak, you won't accomplish anything. You certainly can't help anyone else if you're dead, and weakness doesn't look good on anyone, no matter how pitiful they may seem.

We consider ourselves advanced. Did the cavemen starve? No, of course not. If you were hungry, you go out and kill a fish or dig up a potato. Did the human species of that time die out or debate over beauty? No. If you were horny, you had sex. That was all there was to it. If you didn't want to have sex, you did it anyway because, well...you just did. Were there any laws to keep people safe? No—but people back then probably didn't feel the urge to rape a child or kill someone's father. Could they feel the urge to kill? Probably. How else would they have eaten?

Nowadays, we are a species so dependant on technology that if it were all to disappear, we would die. We used to spend about fifteen hours out of every day hunting for food, and now, we have so much food that we had to start inventing other things to do—toilets to carry bodily waste out of our personal space (without any thought to where it goes, much less); running water and plumbing to make life a little less hard so you don't have to carry the water by bucket back home; and electronics to pass the time between the real necessities of life such as eating and sleeping.

We are a species that glorifies physical beauty to a fault. If a woman doesn't have perfect curves and a prominent jaw line to go with big breasts and long legs, she's ugly. If a man can't control the urge to have sex or go to the gym, he's a pig. If someone doesn't have money, he's a loser. If you spend time alone or doing mental things like reading, you're a nerd. If you watch T.V., you're lazy. We have so much in our lives—so much food, for instance—that only when we don't have it any more do we realize the real significance. Children in other countries are literally starving because there is no food, and while a package of meat defrosts on the kitchen counter here in America while the family is off at school (something else the other countries may not be lucky enough to have) or playing video games, someone is dying because they can't afford to eat or even go to school so that they might one day be able to eat. Freezers and refrigerators full of food here that sit and rot away, and over there, they'd be incredibly _lucky_ to see a slice of mouldy bread or half a glass of clean water.

Humanity sickens me. It really does.

I would never let on how much things bother me. A man doesn't like his girlfriend's breast size, he can ask her to have a surgery to make them bigger. Meanwhile, we are on the verge of an apocalypse caused by our own stupidity because we are too fat and lazy and shy to take a bus or carpool instead of polluting the atmosphere. We litter; we kill; we are destructive. And all people can talk about is celebrities, gossip, who did what on a T.V. show, and whether or not a skirt makes your ass look big.

One thing I have to admire about Bobbi is that she spoke her mind—and her opinions were always well-thought-out and with reason. She wasn't racist because skin has thousands of colors and preferring one should be impossible. She wasn't homophobic because she didn't consider love to be something that understood the genitals between someone's legs. She wasn't cruel enough to let Kerry starve or wail all night because she was cruel enough to forget about her twin. Then again, at fourteen, I didn't need as much as a baby would. It would have been nice, though, if we had remained as close as we had been as children. She was a feminist because she understood the hardships women faced and continue to face, but she didn't talk much about being a feminist because she understood the male side of life, too—though how she could, I doubt I'll ever know. She tried to understand everyone and everything. She read books about war so complex in detail and conflicted emotions that I wanted to throw them at her. She said it was to help her understand males—what they went through and sometimes still go through in other countries. She kept saying that the books were full of valuable lessons, and that the moral dilemma between right and wrong is stronger than ever in war. She was the kind of girl, so perfect at everything, that I knew my mother would always love more than she could love me, the one with opinions and thoughts that I had taken the time to find for myself, to figure out which ideas and views I was most comfortable with and which ones I wasn't.

Maybe Bobbi did that and read for a deeper understanding. It wouldn't surprise me if she did, mostly because she was like that. She wasn't satisfied until she looked better than I did.

After a while, I stopped trying. I stopped trying to be perfect. It was what humanity wanted. And humanity was a wreck.

I stopped and peered through the flowered bushes around the edge of the white picket fence surrounding Wyeth's cabin. He'd given the cabin to his eldest daughter for her birthday, but since she wouldn't be home to live in it until she finished college, he used it as a shelter and vacation home as needed. (His daughter was unknown about to the rest of the family, the result of a night with an exotic dancer he didn't want his current wife and young child to know about.)

He had told me that he never mentioned the cabin to his wife, and would tell her that he sold it years ago if ever she found out he once had one. It was a good thing he'd thought that through, since the cabins around this particular lake were the only ones allowed. No construction was ever to be done there, so the cabins that were already there became increasingly popular. Anyone lucky enough to own one was encouraged to rent it out periodically for profit.

A light was on in one of the upstairs bedrooms—the middle one he and I had stayed in once. It had a cushioned window seat with a great view of the lake, but I have to admit that I didn't spend much time looking out at the lake. That would be the middle room, the one with the private attached bathroom and attic access. The attic was where Wyeth's most important papers were kept. It had been an honour (one I'd never mention) to be so close to the things he guarded with his life and the lives of everyone around him, when clearly nobody else had ever been trusted to be so close to him and to his secrets.

He would be on guard. He had to know people were after him—it was why he was here instead of at home. A knock on the door could set off a bomb.

But unless I wanted to risk sneaking up to the third floor and scaring him by showing up unannounced in a window, I had to knock.

I could feel his eyes on me. I could almost hear the tremble of his hand around the cocked gun no doubt trained on my cranium. I didn't dare to look up.

The door opened after a moment, and Wyeth grabbed me. In the six or so days since the explosion, he didn't look any less intimidating—or feel any less powerful. His muscular form towered over me, and his spiked black hair still remained as upright as he kept his minions. His black shirt and pants set looked fresh. So did the long, jagged cut over his right eye. That would leave a scar, no doubt—and the look in his eyes, one of fierce determination, hadn't faded. If anything, it had intensified.

He closed and locked the door behind me, but he didn't let go of my arm as he led me up the stairs. I tried not to shiver in the frozen air, so cold that every exhale left a transparent white trail of vapour to trail behind me as we hurried up the stairs.

Wyeth clearly thought I was remembering what we'd done last time we were here, and he smiled at me. I, knowing that he wouldn't want to hear anything other than that I was remembering what he was, smiled and prepared myself for any questions he would ask.

"They caught you, didn't they?" Wyeth asked.

"Yes, sir," I replied, without stopping. He led me to the middle bedroom on the third floor and turned to me, as though waiting for an explanation.

I explained as much as I could remember. Then, feeling confident, I asked him why his suitcase was full of clothes on the double bed.

"I must leave this country," he replied. "They have already figured out who several of my best aliases are, so it's only a matter of time before they find out the rest."

He pulled me closer, and I rested my head on his bare chest. For a moment, we just stayed there, his right arm around me, and my fingernail tracing pictures on his stomach.

When he pulled away, he sighed.

"Unfortunately, it also means the female alias you usually used is also at risk, which is something you clearly don't need right now if they've already had you locked up."

I nodded. "Yes."

"I stored several offshore, and one of my agents is bringing them to me. Perhaps you'd like to come with me. The Caiman Islands are beautiful at this time of year."

I smiled, but he didn't notice. He had gone back to packing.

He wanted me with him. I could be with him, and be safe. I could be free.

"Is there anything you'll need? A new bikini or something?"

I smiled again and nodded, although the last one he had gotten me still fit perfectly.

"Good." He was distracted, and folded the sheet of paper he had found into a pocket of his suitcase. "Do you think you'll need anything else? Sun lotion, maybe?"

"Everything will be fine," I replied, to which he looked up, surprised, and smiled. It was as if he hadn't realized he needed reassurance until he got it.

For the first time ever, his smile wasn't laced with menace and mystery. It was a pure smile, one that was clearly all about happiness.

He stopped packing and came over to me again, this time to envelope me in a tight embrace. It was a little like being back in my father's arms—except, of course, when I hugged my father, his hugs had been awkward. As though he didn't really want to touch me. It was ironic that the hugs from my father were far more awkward than hugs from Wyeth, a supposed criminal, whose gun poked at my hip when we hugged. But Wyeth didn't hold back. He liked touching me. He didn't seem daunted by the way I felt, or the way I liked his touch to linger. Of course, I never acted with my father as I did with Wyeth—because my father was far less powerful and therefore, far less interesting. Power was a turn-on, and Wyeth's power, mixed with his need for achieved goals most people never would even dream of, was far more of anything than my father had ever been. Even so, both had been muscular men who towered over me as though I was a child again, and although Wyeth's hug was tighter and more confident, which was comforting, it was also cuddlier—as my father was the kind of guy who was stiff and polite with his daughters in a way he would never be with his sons.

Perhaps he thought daughters could never live up to sons. Or maybe, like most fathers, he was nervous about the feel of breasts other than his wife's pressing against his chest. That was definitely not a problem with Wyeth. It was that or a much less pleasant thought—that my father had been attracted to younger girls and was afraid he'd be attracted to his own daughters if he allowed himself to feel anything other than paternal protectiveness for us.

"You really are one of a kind," he finally said, reluctantly pulling away. I resisted the urge to smile again as he spoke—saying what was practically high praise, coming from him. "We'll live a long, happy life together somewhere else. Somewhere safe."

That was ironic, too. We were the enemy, according to most people. And we were still in danger.

"That will be nice," I said, although Wyeth usually hates for anyone to speak out of turn. Usually, you don't speak unless he speaks to you—and you be sure to use a neutral, respectful tone and add a "Yes, sir," to the end of it if you report bad news to him or you'll never have to worry about what tone you use again.

Just then, a loud bang from downstairs made me jump. Wyeth looked up, almost bored, but he had tensed up and reached for his hip holster. He wasn't expecting guests.

"Police!" came a shout from downstairs.

Wyeth grabbed me and hurled me into the attic, the door to it open and previously unnoticed. He closed me in—and as heavy footsteps approached, I heard the family gun ready itself for battle.

_At least he won't go down without a fight,_ I thought, feeling helpless in the dark. I was crouched on the door, listening. A single gunshot sounded, and I waited a moment for another. But the following voices weren't arguing with Wyeth, and before I could comprehend what that meant, the door I was crouched on fell away as an officer decided to check the attic—and I tumbled out, five guns pointed at me, and landed with a yelp only two feet from the bleeding corpse of my former guardian, his hand still clenched tightly around the gun that had put the final bullet through his skull.

I was caught.

It was over.

* * *

**Author's Note: No, the story isn't over—but hopefully Dahlia's freedom is a thing of the past now...just when she thought everything would be perfect...not! :P  
Thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed so far! :D**


	25. Chapter 25

**Chapter 2****5**

I know some people aren't fortunate enough to live out their whole lives in one house, but I was one of the few who lived fourteen years in the same house. Stacey, Mary Anne, Kristy, Mallory, Jessi, Dawn, Abby, and Logan weren't so lucky. Shannon Kilbourne was, although I never considered her much of a friend. As an associate member, she was on-call and only took jobs the seven regular members couldn't handle. That didn't happen often, but when it did, it was great to have someone to call on.

Sitting on my bed, looking around—it was hard to believe this was the room I would soon be leaving behind. We had held countless BSC meetings here. We'd argued and slept and had countless pillow fights, right here. I had rummaged for candy and painted almost every picture I'd ever done here. When Dawn and I had been stranded on the island, my friends had come here to support each other. It was hard to imagine my stuff—the desk Mimi had bent over beside me to help me with my homework, the window that faced my former friends' former homes—in a different room or as something from my past.

A little part of me was excited, though. Along with the stability I'd had, I never had the chance to make a fresh start. I had grown up with the faces around me—Rick Chow, Pete Black, and Alan Gray, among others. What would it be like to start fresh, in a place where nobody knew that my sister had an IQ of almost 200 and memories of Stacey's death didn't come back to haunt me whenever I stopped at the corner of Elm street (where it connects with Oak) on my way to school? And it could be a fresh start in a new way—new friends, new baby-sitting clients, and maybe a few boys who didn't know I was once sent back to the seventh grade.

There would be no more walking past houses of former friends and clients. Jessi had gotten used to life in Stamford, and Mallory's family, as far as I knew, had moved to Riverbend so she didn't have to travel so far to see them. And, of course, Cokie Mason, Alan Gray, and Cary Retlin, people who used to annoy the BSC, would also be a part of the past.

And Bobbi would be in Chicago, too. At least I'd know one person. And I could still watch Kerry.

_Maybe Janine was right. It IS time to put the past behind us and move on._

Just as the thought was clear in my mind, my bedside phone rang. As I answered it, I realized that I would have to change my number and get used to a new one if we moved.

"Hello?"

"Claudia."

"Kristy? I didn't expect to hear from you," I replied, honestly surprised. Having just decided to put the past behind me, I had thought Kristy would just fade off into the back of my mind, someone I'd remember when I was ninety years old and suffering from Alzheimer's and think was a hallucination.

Okay, maybe not. It's hard to forget someone you spent almost thirteen full years of your life with. But I hadn't expected her to call. What was there to say?

"Yeah, well, I didn't want to."

"Then why did you?"

"Because I heard you were moving to Chicago. Is that true?" It figured that I had just emotionally closed a chapter of my life and Kristy, always strong-headed, had opened it again. Would she mention the poisoned dog treats? Would she want to reminisce? Or was she just calling to give me a push—to rid Stoneybrook of the last of her former friends?

"Yes, it's true."

"Because you made the News? Is that why you're leaving?"

"Why do you care? You stopped caring ten months ago," I said, honestly not trying to be mean or unfair. I just couldn't see what she was getting at and her questioning me after so long without bothering to talk to me at all was annoying.

"Because I heard from Miranda Shillaber that you were leaving, and I should have been told first."

"We've only notified the school, Kristy. I didn't tell Miranda or anyone else I was leaving. She must have overheard us talking. And why should you have been informed first? We aren't even friends anymore."

There was a short silence following my words, in which I was unsure of whether Kristy was laughing, crying, or if she was still on the line at all.

"We used to be," she finally replied, and although her voice wasn't perfectly steady, I still wasn't sure if she would laugh or cry or hang up.

"Yes, we did. That's all in the past now, though."

"How can you be so cruel? Think of everything we went through together! All of those BSC pizza parties, the trip to California—didn't any of that mean anything to you?" She sounded almost hysterical, and her voice had gotten too loud for my liking at three-sixteen P.M. on Friday. After any school day, I don't like to come home and be yelled at. On this day, with the sudden stress of Dahlia's capture lifted and the new stress of moving thrust back at me, and the thought of being dateless to my first and last SHS dance, I was in no mood for Kristy's hysterics. At least I wouldn't have to worry about homework—the school hadn't assigned any. Luckily.

"Yes, it did!" I snapped. "The things we went through as friends and as members of the Baby-Sitters Club—that was all great! But it's something we're never going to get back!" I sighed a little, already regretting my words as memories flashed through my mind. Not _everything_ about the BSC had been great—arguing certainly hadn't been a highlight for the books, and Kristy being such a perfectionist had been a real drag. Why was she even calling? Just to drag me down and make me just as miserable as she'd been? "Why are you calling?" I finally asked.

"Why do you care?" Kristy imitated me.

"If you don't have anything to say, I'm going to hang up—" I began.

"_Okay_,_ okay_," Kristy replied irritably. "I called because I wanted to make things right between us. We were all we had. Now it looks like we won't even have that."

I felt a little guilty suddenly. Kristy would be alone, aside from Shannon and Logan, in Stoneybrook. Everyone else had left, and when Kristy finally called to make peace, I was leaving. And while I might have been all Kristy had, although she hadn't seemed interested in me while I was here, I had moved on. I had made friends.

_Don't feel bad. It isn't your fault your family wants to move to Chicago, or that Kristy waited a year before calling to make peace. It isn't a bad thing to have other friends._

I knew it was true, but I still felt a little bad. I had moved on while I was here, and Kristy hadn't. Now I was moving away, more literally, and she would still be here, in a small town full of memories, both good and bad. Would her previous withdrawal from life return and worsen?

_It isn't your fault if she had a breakdown, and it won't be your fault if she has another,_ the rational part of my mind shouted. _You want to go to Chicago. You need a fresh start. And, anyway, you don't have much of a choice. Your family is going to Chicago._

The irrational part of my mind just kept screaming. Everything felt like it was crowding in on me again—stresses and pressures from all of the different aspects of my life.

In a voice far too calm to express the inner turmoil my mind was feeling, I tried to gently explain—avoiding the details—what had happened to me. I still wasn't sure I could trust her. And since she would soon be a part of my past, I had to let go of her. And she would have to let go of me, which would probably be harder for her than it would for me, although she'd make it hard for me because it's impossible not to in a situation like this. She listened silently, but I could imagine her propped up beside the phone and picking the strings from a hole in her jeans.

I wasn't imagining the new Kristy, though. I imagined a short girl with a brown ponytail and a baseball cap with a collie on it, wearing jeans and a T-shirt despite the February chill. I imagined David Michael running from Sam as she sat there. (Charlie had been home from college the last time I'd seen him, which had been the night Emily and I saw him leave for a basketball game with Sam when we were spying on Kristy, but was likely back at school now. Maybe that was one of the reasons for Kristy's depression; two divorces and a brother, soon to be two, off at college. It must have felt like her life was falling apart.) The chaos that used to define her life—a house full of people and animals, all busy—was gone. Her stepfather was out of the picture now, and he'd taken his children, Karen and Andrew, with him to Fire Island when he moved. He took Emily Michelle, the Vietnamese orphan he adopted, with him. Kristy's grandmother moved out with her boyfriend. The animals still live at home, but I doubt it's much of a consolation when you've lost your second father figure, a brother, a grandmother, and three little siblings.

I had done my best to explain my situation as best I could, without detail—but when I finished, I heard only silence from Kristy's end of the line. When I was finally about to ask if she was still there, I heard the disconcerting click that disconnected the last tie I had to Stoneybrook.

The phone rang before I could put it back in the cradle, so I answered it. I expected Kristy to laugh and tell me Shannon (the dog) had unplugged the phone from the wall.

"Claudia?" Emily sounded nervous, and I was suddenly wishing we'd put off calling the school. How many students would call me before I actually left?

Only two, apparently. Emily was the last call of the day. She wanted to know if 'the rumors' were true, and I confirmed them. It was about the only thing we said. What had once been a friendship built on suspicion and recovery from our individual tragedies was now nothing more than two stranger-style acquaintances who happened to know each other's numbers. It was like we were business people; formal with everyone and close to no one.

After all the secrets we'd shared—in the last three months and even before that...our friendship would end with an emotionless discussion about whether it was true that I was leaving, and probably never coming back? I couldn't let this happen. Enough sacrifices had been made. I had to salvage whatever I could.

I could let a thirteen-year friendship go, but I wasn't about to let Emily go with it into a past I would probably try my best to forget for the rest of my life. I wouldn't ever forget Mimi or Stacey or the real friends I had, and Emily had been a good friend. She may not have been beside me in the cages, but she had come pretty close—in her own home. My abusers had been the sister of my friend, but it hadn't been a related guardian of mine. Of all the people I had ever met—aside from Ashley, who had also seemed abused, though aside from in the cages, I didn't know for sure about that yet—Emily would probably be one of the few who could come close to understanding. Besides, it was good that she hadn't been with me in the cages. I wouldn't wish it on anyone.

I don't really know how the conversation started, or how long it lasted. In fact, I really don't remember a lot of it. But when we hung up, I knew we would be okay. We already had each other's e-mail addresses. We would keep in touch. That was good, too. Losing everything I'd had would make restarting so much harder.

When I glanced up at the clock, I realized that my stomach was rumbling and that unless I hurried, I would either go to the dance with an empty stomach or without makeup.

I slipped three Pizza Pops onto a plate and microwaved them as I gathered my makeup together. I figured I could eat and do my makeup in half an hour, unless the phone rang.

I had spent enough time thinking back and tying together some of the loose ends of my life. Things were about to change, and I was going to change with them. I was going to do better in school, no matter which school I ended up in. My parents would do well at their new jobs, and Janine would make a good impression at whatever college she ended up attending. If my parents ended up getting divorced, it would be sad. But I wasn't going to worry about that now. Maybe the move would solve all of our problems. And if it didn't, my life wouldn't fall apart. I knew I could be strong enough to survive something like that. I had survived plenty already.

I ate, brushed my teeth, took a quick shower, did my hair and makeup—and was ready in an hour. It wouldn't matter if I was late to the dance; I didn't have a date. And since Emily and I were going together, and she'd be late, maybe it was kind of a good thing. I just hoped Ashley would forgive me—since I hadn't been able to get back to the city, we'd had to settle for talking on the phone. She had been questioned, and the police asked me about her, but it looked like they were going to leave her alone. Maybe a fresh start was what she would need, too. She was excited about being in Chicago, and especially with living with us when she was out of the hospital. I just hoped everything would go well when the five of us lived together.

"Claudia? Have you been on the phone all day?" Mom asked, when I bounced down the stairs and prepared to meet Emily. We'd agreed to meet at the bus stop, where we'd take the bus to school. Because the buses didn't run late enough for us to return home by bus, Mom had offered to pick us up. But one of the conditions for my going to the dance at all was to be done my homework. I hadn't told her that I didn't have any.

"No," I replied, "because I spent an hour getting ready for school, six hours in school, and another hour getting ready for the dance."

"And what about the four-and-a-half hours unaccounted for?" Mom asked, not fooled.

"I had to solve some problems between old friends. Since we're leaving," I added, knowing it was a solid reason she wouldn't waste time arguing with. "And I don't have any homework."

"Okay," Mom replied. She shrugged, as though she couldn't believe that a school wouldn't give out homework. "Will you be warm enough?"

She and I both knew that she was really asking me whether or not I actually planned on showing up in public in the dress I'd picked out. It was a metallic red dress with pink and white ribbon tassels hung over the back of the shoulders, and a layered hem that was fashionably uneven. The neckline was a little low, and the dress itself was a little tight, but as far as I was concerned, that made it perfect for a Valentine's Day dance. The whole point is to look good, and with the red heels I'd chosen to wear, I looked good enough for a dance called the 'Heart Hop.' I'd pulled my hair back in a braid held together with a pink flower, and while I wasn't particularly clashing, I would definitely be noticed among the miniskirts other girls had chosen.

"No, but it won't matter," I added hurriedly. "We'll work up some heat at the dance, and you can blast the heater the whole way home if you like."

Mom shook her head a little, but shrugged again.

Emily and I entered the gym about twenty minutes later. She and I hadn't said much on the walk, but as we entered, I suddenly knew I would miss her and Stoneybrook when we left. Unlike the SMS school gym, which was where I went to all of last year's dances, the SHS gym was decorated—tastefully, I have to admit. Pink and white streamers sloped from the corners of the gym to the center, where pink, white, and silver balloons were grouped together like a cluster of grapes. Silver rain (like tinsel, but longer and thicker) hung from the ceiling. Along one wall was a long table under a white tablecloth, covered in snacks, pink confetti, and refreshments. Helium balloons in pink and silver stood at each end of the table, weighed down by red heart paperweights. Red hearts covered the walls, and the band had already started playing. Groups of kids and several couples were already dancing, but almost everyone was just laughing and talking and eating. Almost everyone was dressed up, so I knew Kristy wasn't here yet—she'd probably wear jeans and sneakers to the dance, if she came at all. Her school attendance hadn't been great, so I wondered if she even knew about the dance.

Unwilling to let Kristy see that I'd come with Emily and not even mentioned the dance to her when we'd spoken only an hour earlier, I left Emily with Elizabeth Parker and gravitated toward the snack table to check out the goods. I saw a lot of variety—chocolate cupcakes with pink frosting, heart-shaped cookies, red punch, as well as the usual soda and chips—but I didn't see the one person who would probably be there. Kristy and Mary Anne spent most of their dance time at the snack table, but Mary Anne wouldn't be here. Still, knowing Kristy's past insistence on punctuality, I was surprised that she wasn't here yet. It wasn't like her to miss out on anything involving her school, her town, or anything else—thinking about how she'd thought she deserved to be told first that I was leaving was just one of many examples—and I wondered again if my explanation about my move was that upsetting to her.

In the past, that would have been a no-brainer. Of course she would want to know first. Of course she'd be upset. Unfortunately, things had changed—and as far as I could tell, things were going to continue changing.

* * *

**Author's Note: Here it is… :D**


	26. Chapter 26

**Chapter 2****6**  
**  
**Moving day. It felt like only hours had passed since the dance, but it had actually been several days. Apparently, my parents had been considering the move to Chicago for quite some time, but had been unsure of how to mention it. I was sure my parents had planned it with Bobbi's mother so that we'd all end up in Chicago, but who knew?

I knew I should probably feel overwhelmed. There was so much to do in so little time, although a lot of it had already been done in the seven or so days since the dance (and eight or so days since my parents' announcement). But all I felt was calm.

"Claudia? I hope you aren't eating junk food!"

(Since the night of the announcement about Chicago, when I'd skipped supper and my mother had come to check on me, she'd been worried about my eating habits. I'd been so wrapped up in my thoughts that I hadn't even hidden the box of cookies I'd been snacking on. She saw them, and although she hadn't mentioned anything right away, she was mentioning it almost every chance she had now.)

"I'm not!" I lied. There was no way she could see me. I was sitting in my bedroom, eating a Twinkie (I had filled one whole box with junk food hidden around my room, and kept it open) and looking around at my boxes. Filling them had been easy enough, and I'd decorated them since with my markers. They looked a little like Kid-Kits now, but that was okay. There were seven (two of books, one of CDs, one of snacks, and three of jewelry and art supplies) all together, and I doubted anyone could lose them. Unless, of course, they were color-blind.

I didn't care if she knew I _was_ eating junk food. She knows I do. I'd had a good breakfast. But I'd care if she caught me lying, so I hid the Twinkie wrapper in my coat pocket when I was finished.

It would be so weird to leave this room. My window had always faced the street, and more importantly, the houses of my friends. We had solved many mysteries on Stoneybrook. We had cleaned up a lot of vomit in Stoneybrook, too. Some memories would be good to leave behind.

But not all of them. While my aunt's miscarriage was a bad thing, some good had come from it. And Lynn was adorable, but we'd only get to see her once in a while now that we were moving.

A heavy knock on my door made me jump, and I barely had time to straighten up from my spot over a box of art supplies before the door opened. Apprehensive, I watched as the person barged in. Kristy stepped in and froze, looking around. It was clearly a shock to her, seeing the former BSC headquarters so empty. She stared at me, wide-eyed.

"I didn't think you were actually leaving," she murmured.

"It's moving day," I pointed out, but that didn't seem to make her feel any better. I felt the strangest emptiness as I spoke; as though I was reading from a script and wouldn't be affected by anything I said. Maybe the reality of the whole situation just hadn't hit yet. It was possible. My friends had all moved a time or two, but I never did. Their stories were interesting, but they were never all that real to me. Now, maybe I would understand what they meant.

"I guess I just thought you were kidding," Kristy replied, her voice unusually soft, and when she glanced at me, her eyes looked kind of moist, like she was fighting tears. She looked away quickly, but even as she looked around again, I couldn't help but feel as though I should say something to her. Anything. We'd once been friends, after all. And even though I was trying, I just couldn't find anything to say that wouldn't sound like it was a farewell cliché like you might hear in a movie. It's hard to say good-bye to someone you thought was out of your life. It's especially hard when the other person was a friend and doesn't seem to realize that you are over them, and even more so when that person is obviously not over you yet.

I shook my head and resisted the urge to point out that I hadn't been very tolerant of humor in the past few months. I didn't have to, anyway. Kristy, judging by her expression of sadness, seemed to understand.

"It's just going to be so hard," she sighed finally. "You were all I had left."

"You didn't seem to care much about me or anyone else for the last few months," I couldn't resist pointing out. "I didn't think it would even matter to you."

Kristy looked like she'd been slapped. But she didn't point out the obvious. Instead, she just stood there for a moment, without speaking, until at last she sighed in what sounded like defeat before looking at me again. "I was afraid of losing another person I cared about."

Another silence. I knew we had at least fifteen minutes before the moving van and the men were here to load our furniture and boxes, but it would be fifteen long minutes. I used to think an hour to make my good-byes wouldn't be enough. Now, it was as if fifteen minutes would be forever.

Who was she, anyway? This wasn't the Kristy Thomas, loudmouth and leader, I'd grown up with. And I'd seen her through some of the toughest times anyone could endure.

I found myself growing angry as I looked her over. She may have gone through two divorces (one when she was too young to remember) and had a brother go off to college, but she didn't know real pain. She had never starved or been incapable of movement. And having a friend you ignored for nearly a year move away shouldn't have been a big deal. So why should I feel sorry for her? It was her own fault if she'd decided to become a vampire and hide out in her house until everyone gave up on her.

"I know you must be mad at me," Kristy said quickly, having noticed my expression. "I would be, too. But I just…couldn't let you go without seeing you."

I didn't know what to say to that. So I didn't say anything.

"And I know it isn't likely you'll ever forgive me for my ignoring you—"

"That isn't really what's bothering me," I interrupted her. "I still don't know if I can trust you. Because of you, several dogs were poisoned."

"I didn't do that!" Kristy cried, holding up her hands as if to show me she was unarmed. "I swear! I just wish I knew how to prove it to you!"

"The detectives found your prints on the bag!" I exploded, and Kristy stared at me.

"Of course they did! Those were Shannon's treats!"

I just stared back. I had put the treats she'd given me into a brown paper bag, but I'd kept the plastic bag she'd handed the treats to me in. (I hadn't wanted the rustling of the plastic to alert a guard to our presence.) The evidence (Kristy's fingerprints) had been on each treat, as well as the plastic, so it was obvious that she'd been involved somehow.

"And you really don't know what kind of poison it was, or how it got there?" I asked, sidestepping her retort and trying to focus on my questions. Her gaze was steady and unnerving.

Kristy shook her head slowly. She was still staring at me, like her gaze could convince me of her innocence. But I'd looked repeatedly into Bobbi's eyes back when I'd still been listening to Emily's accusations, and I hadn't been able to see her innocence. I wasn't about to trust anyone else's eyes for the answers.

_Nobody ever said the answers from the windows to the soul would be easy_, I thought.

"You still don't believe me, do you?" Kristy asked, although her tone indicated that she was either already sure of this, or that she was deep in thought.

"I can't," I replied honestly, and she snapped out of her trance.

"You shouldn't argue with the friends you've got, or you won't have any," Kristy snapped.

Softly, because she had turned around and was probably suppressing tears again, I replied, "I do have friends. And our bond is strong because we _can_ argue."

Kristy turned back to me. Her eyes were far beyond the unwavering gaze of annoyance for a delayed arrival she used to level BSC members with if they were late. They burned with emotion too intense to name, and I was struck by how I'd thought of the BSC and its members as being too shallow for such intensity and was, as I seemed to be a lot lately, proven wrong yet again.

But she didn't speak, and she didn't have to. Her eyes said plenty. She turned and left—she didn't stomp her feet or stalk down the stairs or even slam the door. And for some reason, her silent departure was more daunting than it would have been if she'd yelled at me.

* * *

The moving truck was loaded. My boxes, my furniture, and my life in general were inside. Behind us, as my parents, sister, and I watched the movers close the doors and ready to turn to keys over to my father by going through the paperwork amongst themselves once more, our house sat empty. Someone else had come to look at it, and although I knew the house had to sell for my parents to finalize a payment plan on a house in Chicago, I couldn't imagine our stuff in another house, or someone else's stuff in ours.

"Do you have enough stuff for the road?" Mom asked nervously.

I was nervous, too. The trip would be just over seven hundred miles long (if my calculations were correct) and although we could probably do it in a day by car, it was the nearing the end of February and the roads were expected to be icy. On top of that, we'd have to move ourselves to Chicago. My father would drive the U-Haul, and Janine would be his guide—navigating the maps and keeping an eye out for wildlife. I would be Mom's navigator, despite my poor grades in geography. (I think she trusted me mostly because Dad and Janine would be behind us, and both parents would have their cell phones with them, so Janine could call if we took a wrong turn.) Although we planned on doing the trip in two days, especially since it was now early afternoon (the truck had been supposed to come the previous night but hadn't, so we couldn't leave at six A.M. as planned), I was nervous, too. I don't like car travelling much.

"Snacks, music," I said, patting my knapsack. "A couple of books in case the hotel room doesn't have cable or there's nothing good on."

Mom nodded, but (thankfully) didn't grill me about whether or not I'd remembered to pack any 'feminine products' into the bag I'd be carrying with me. She was instructing my father not to drive too fast, which is a problem he has when he has a long drive. I was glad they'd be in separate cars, so they couldn't argue during the stressful trip.

Bobbi and her family had packed up the night before, and had left early in the morning. Unless we sped or they broke down, it was unlikely we'd meet before we got to Chicago.

"It's kind of scary, isn't it?" Janine asked, making conversation as Mom and Dad fought over the keys to the van, right there in front of the movers.

"The fight?" I asked, knowing perfectly that she was talking about the move.

"Did you make up with Kristy?" was her reply, avoiding explaining herself.

"Not really," I said, with a sigh. "She left and…well, I don't think I'll ever hear from her again. It's hard to say good-bye, especially when only one of us feels she already has."

I didn't bother pointing out that I'd felt like I'd said good-bye to Kristy and Stoneybrook itself a long time ago (everything that had once mattered most to me was gone now), knowing it would ruin the mood. Besides, somehow, Janine understood.

"It's too bad," she said, referring to changes in friendship and changes in general.

Minutes later, when she was climbing into the moving truck and I was swinging my knapsack to the floor at my feet in the front seat of the car, which held some of our delicate things we hadn't wanted transported on the truck, and thinking over Janine's words.

She usually didn't make a lot of sense. I used to think it was because she always seemed so disinterested in the things I liked, which were the only things that seemed to make sense to me. But now she was trying, and actually succeeding.

I slipped a CD into the player and Mom didn't say a word about it when she got in. It wasn't loud. I started in on the bag of chips I'd removed from my knapsack (I'd brought mostly chips because they help to settle car sickness, according to an Internet site I found for long-distance travelers) and again, Mom didn't say a word about it.

"Are you okay?" I finally asked.

"Just nervous, honey," she replied, but she didn't look at me as she spoke, so I wondered if she was lying just for the same of my nerves.

"Me too," I finally replied, but she didn't smile or reassure me. So I turned the volume on the stereo up a little higher, and settled into my seat and ate my chips without another word. If she wanted to go through this trip with an uncomfortable silence, I wasn't going to play along. I certainly wasn't going to contribute to the silence by acting uncomfortable when she didn't bother to speak.

I had taken pictures of every room in our house before we'd started packing (I wanted to keep the image of the home I'd grown up most in with me forever) and hoped Mom wasn't upset about the move. It had sounded like it was her idea, after all.

_Maybe she regrets the decision, now that it seems so much more real,_ I thought.

After about an hour, Mom finally told me to turn the volume down. (It had actually been sixty-eight minutes.) I did, just because she'd finally spoken to me.

We were leaving Stoneybrook, but I felt as though I wasn't really leaving my home behind. Maybe it was because Stoneybrook had stopped feeling like home when my friends left. Or maybe it was because I'd somehow just stopped feeling things.

Or, and I liked this thought more, I had grown up and could deal with things like this now. I may have been leaving a house, but my family and my real friends would be with me in Chicago. Ashley and Bobbi would be there. A year and six months ago, if someone had asked me who would be with me a year and a half from then, I would have answered without hesitation and rattled off the names of the BSC members. Little did I know just how different things would be. Stacey was dead. Kristy was uncaring—or had seemed so until very recently. Everyone else had moved away. And I seemed to be the only one really moving on. Jessi's move was brought on mostly by Mallory's transferring to boarding school, and Kristy couldn't deal with much of anything in a way other than to hide in her room all day. And I was now leaving Stoneybrook for good—moving away and moving on.

Stacey probably would have been proud of me. Despite our many ups and downs, we'd been close for the better part of a year—our first year as teenagers. She had always seemed so sophisticated. Now, although I may not have _looked_ sophisticated, I _felt_ mature. And considering that, awhile ago, I would have said you had to feel mature to look mature, or look mature to feel mature or something like that, it was probably an improvement.

I still felt calm, although the stirrings of previously dormant feelings were bubbling in my stomach as familiar landmarks gave way to new sights, sounds, and smells. Soon, even the most familiar of surroundings—places I had travelled through on other trips I would return home to Stoneybrook from—were behind us. Maybe this felt so different because we wouldn't be returning. Maybe because our house, formerly busy every day for close to sixteen years, was now empty, just a shell of our former lives. Would our memories forever swim the halls of the house? Would the next people to live there still hear our voices—me calling Stacey just to chat, Janine and I arguing, Mimi's soft voice? Would they know just how special that house was? Would they stay as long as we had? Would they ever wonder how the dent in the laundry room got there, or would they even notice? I saw it every time I did my laundry, and remembered the way it had happened. I'd been seven years old and carting a basket of towels upstairs because I wanted to help my mother. I'd slipped on a fallen sock and my head hit the wall. The plastic headband covered in spiky squares had made the dent, and given me a headache. I hadn't ever worn the headband again (it was ruined) but I still had it, tucked away in my sock drawer. Now, of course, it was in the box marked 'Art Supplies' and decorated with shiny star stickers.

_And, just like that headband, life may dent you but it will never destroy you. And don't forget it, Claudia Lynn Kishi,_ my mind said, and as we drove away from all that was familiar and into the unknown, I felt myself relax at the thought. The unknown was scary, but I could handle it.

* * *

**Author's Note: Here it is…the final chapter for Accusations! I may do a sequel yet or add another chapter if this one didn't seem conclusive enough, but for tonight, I'll say that the story (this part, anyway) is done. Feedback, please?**

**Thank you immensely to everyone who read, reviewed, and even just looked. This has been an incredible experience, writing a fic this long with so much outside input. I hope it ended satisfactorily for everyone! :D**


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